


embark (with your soul next to mine)

by kingburu



Series: til we grow old [4]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Bottom!Jason Grace, Canon Compliant, Demisexual Jason Grace, Honeymoon, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-22
Updated: 2020-09-22
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:27:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 28,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26588860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kingburu/pseuds/kingburu
Summary: “You love differently, Jason,” Nico continues. “That’s all it is.”“That’s not all it is,” Jason says. He stares at the ceiling, thinking of all of his friends that are waiting for them to come back to the surface.He knows there are different loves—sisterly love, for Thalia and Persephone. Parental love, like Emily and Esperanza, and Hades, platonic love for Leo and Piper, familial love for the pack, emotional love, for Nico. And then there’s sex, but even making love felt more emotional than just getting off.He loves being able to wake up to Nico as much as he loves watching Nico tilt his head back in pleasure. Maybe more so, because he gets to fall asleep beside his boyfriend and repeat the cycle—of waking up and falling a little deeper in love with Nico.“What do you think it is?” Nico asks him, when he’s quiet too long.“I’m not sure yet,” Jason admits. “But I’m close.”--After coming back to life, Jason finds answers to questions he thought died with him the first time.AKA -- the one where Jason finds out he's demisexual
Relationships: Nico di Angelo/Jason Grace, Thalia Grace/Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano
Series: til we grow old [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1804777
Comments: 8
Kudos: 166





	embark (with your soul next to mine)

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!! So this is a story that I've been dabbling with for a couple of months since the summer, but I shelved it for a while because of the topics that it covers and how it gets covered. I've had a couple of people read the story beforehand to make sure things sound right or represented appropriately but I understand it's still possible that I've misrepresented something. Please let me know your thoughts, as I would love your input!
> 
> The title of this story is inspired by the song I Will Follow You Into the Dark by Death Cab for Cutie. 
> 
> **I will warn that there are some parts of this story where it gets a little uncomfortable when Piper's name is mentioned, so please be extra careful when you see her name crop up!**
> 
> And of course, please enjoy this story!

They don’t really talk about living arrangements until later. Jason gets to have a redo of his birthday, where Piper and Leo cling onto him like a second skin and he sees his big sister burst into tears as she steps through the door of Frank’s praetor house. Jason eats more than his weight’s worth of a variety of foods, to the point that Nico has to reel him back in before Thalia, Percy, and he get into a nonsensical eating contest.

Jason’s favorite part of the night is watching Nico’s oily black eyes peel away from Reyna to meet his gaze. The smile on Nico’s face matches the love in Jason’s own expression.

When they finally leave, Jason reaches for Nico’s hand again, instinctive, and they shadowtravel back to Long Island. Jason is met with the crackling fire of Hestia’s hearth, embers dancing in the summer wind like fireflies, and stars hanging in the evening like ornaments. The winds brush against his skin, and a lump swells against his throat as the scent of burning wood fills his nostrils.

Nico curls a hand against the inside of Jason’s forearm to catch his attention. His image is blurry, which is when Jason realizes there are tears in his eyes. When he blinks them away, he realizes Nico is looking at him with concern. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Jason replies. “I never thought I’d step foot in Camp Halfblood again. I—”

Jason smiles sheepishly and gestures between them, where their hands are touching.

“—I never thought I’d have a chance,” he confesses. “That _we_ had a chance.”

Nico studies him, and then a hand gently reaches out and brushes a tear from Jason’s cheek. He reaches out again and kisses Jason gingerly. The touch is gentle—lukewarm, even, and Jason leans in for another. He feels Nico’s fingers pad his jaw as he buries his hands in Nico’s mop of hair. When they pull away again, Nico peers back at him, forehead pressed against Jason’s own.

“You’re stuck with me now, Jason,” Nico teases, and the words just make Jason want to float, like he’s a ghost.

Jason lifts his foot when he feels something needling at the sole of his shoe. A flower erupts from the dirt—long stems with bright yellow petals branching out like clouds. He hears Nico laughing quietly in his ear.

“That one’s new,” he remarks, and the smile across Nico’s face just makes more flowers appear.

“Goldenrods,” Jason tells him, and for the umpteenth time, he plucks the flowers from dirt and hands it to Nico. “Persephone made me memorize all of the flowers in her garden.”

Nico stares at him incredulously, but Jason just collects a second bundle of goldenrods. “That’s a lot of flowers.”

“It made the time go by faster.”

“For what?”

“To see you again,” Jason says blithely, then he hands the mini bouquet to Nico.

Nico stares back at him, startled, and red suddenly dusts over his cheekbones. He takes the goldenrods gently, and Jason can’t help but think about how the warm hue of petals accents the black of Nico’s hair and compliments his pale skin.

The corner of Jason’s lips curls, and he leans over to do his favorite thing as of late: kiss Nico on the forehead. “You’re stuck with me too, Nico.”

The expression on Nico’s face melts, until it matches Jason’s own, and they walk hand-in-hand towards the Big House. There’s a laugh or two as flowers sprout behind Jason’s feet with each step—but Jason’s too enamored by Nico to care.

Chiron is startled when they arrive.

“I guess you’re wondering why I’m not dead,” Jason says, and Nico snorts. They sit close on the couch, even if their hands aren’t intertwined. Nico’s thigh is pressed against Jason’s own, and they lean into each other like counterbalances.

Chiron makes a thoughtful hum as he crosses his arms together, and then shakes his head. “Not necessarily.”

Jason blinks, surprised. The first time he ever met Chiron, the centaur had blanched white and claimed he was supposed to be dead. Now, Chiron sits in his wheelchair, much less perturbed. Chiron takes notice immediately.

“Well,” Chiron elaborates. “Leo Valdez came back from the dead. Not to mention that sister of yours, Hazel Levesque, Nico. And Thalia cheated death by turning into a tree for a sum amount of years. Unless your resurrection is prophetic in any way?”

“Um, no,” Jason reassures, “Hades let me go.”

Chiron stares hard, then slowly turns his gaze to Nico. “The King of the Dead…just let someone go?”

Nico nods, and Chiron looks more perplexed.

“There was a test,” Jason reassures, though he’s not sure why he’s trying to validate being alive. “Like Orpheus and Eurydice. I passed.”

“Fair enough,” Chiron says, and he concedes from whatever skepticism from what he has. “Well—the harpies have kept your cabin tidy. You may have to put on some new sheets, but I believe whatever belongings were in your cabin are still—”

“Actually,” Jason interrupts, and his eyebrows knit together. He turns to his boyfriend, who stares back curiously. “I know we’re placed in our cabin based on our godly parent, but Queen Persephone and King Hades have taken care of me in the last couple of years. I’d feel more comfortable in Cabin Thirteen.”

Nico blinks, evidently taken aback by the declaration.

Chiron’s expression twists again, his demeanor pale. “I’m afraid that’s against the rules, Jason. Plus—there’s no telling how your father would react.”

“I’m not sure Dad even knows I’m alive yet,” Jason says earnestly, and he scratches at the tattoo in his arm. “Plus—an uncle is basically a parent.”

Thankfully, Nico places a hand over Jason’s, fingers running over his wrist bone. He flashes a curious look, and Jason finds solace in it. “Is that what you want?”

Jason nods. As far as he knows, the last thought Jupiter had of him was their interaction Athens when Jason called the King of the Gods unwise. Lightning and storms still conjure at Jason’s will, but his connection to his father has felt silent since the end of the second war.

Chiron clears his throat, his eyes falling to the way Jason is thoughtfully running his knuckles against Nico’s thigh. Jason reels his hand back, red in his cheeks.

“Do you _actually_ have rules for what to do with people who come back from the dead?” Nico asks, an eyebrow arched.

“Well,” the centaur says, “no.”

They stare back at him plainly.

“I suppose that would fall under _your_ domain, Nico,” Chiron says finally in defeat. He stares back at them in defeat, and shrugs, evidently at a loss. “And you are head counsellor of Cabin Thirteen. Do you want a roommate?”

Jason turns his head back to Nico—and he’s already met with a smile.

Nico presses a kiss to his cheek. “Welcome to Cabin Thirteen, Jason.”

*

Cabin Thirteen looks relatively different since the last time Jason stepped foot in it. Nico’s pushed his twin bed against the wall to catch sunlight. There are vases under the windowsill, where Jason recognizes the dandelion and tulip he’d given Nico ages ago.

“Weird, right?” Nico asks him. He takes the goldenrods and places them in another porcelain vase. He peers back up, and Jason finds his heart skipping a beat.

“You kept them?” Jason asks.

“They have a death aura around them,” Nico explains. He inspects the goldenrods under a lamp, and then holds them out for Jason to inspect himself. “Maybe because my stepmother taught you while you were dead. I thought they’d wilt after a while, but they haven’t.”

“So you kept them,” Jason repeats, and Nico smiles back at him.

“Most flowers wilt when I touch them,” Nico says. He gingerly places the vase next to the windowsill. “These don’t.”

There’s an ease in Nico’s tone that just lifts Jason’s heart. He sets his lone box from Cabin One near the door, then looks at the assortment of flowers against the windowsill. Beside the psychology books is the crown of roses from the day before, and Jason brushes his hand against the soft petals gently.

He’s aware of Nico watching him. The last time Jason stepped foot in Cabin Thirteen, his feelings were still locked away. They sat feet away from each other on amicable terms, and Jason decided he’d have to admire Nico di Angelo from afar.

Now, he knows that all of those conversations meant just as much to Nico as they did to him, and his mouth just hurts from smiling.

He turns his head and folds an arm around Nico again, then presses a kiss to Nico’s forehead.

“I really love you,” Jason murmurs.

He _loves_ watching Nico raise his head, and _loves_ that Nico smiles back at him, leaning into his warmth as Jason leans into Nico’s, and they kiss again.

“Me too,” Nico whispers back. “I love you too.”

And then he yawns, leaning further into Jason. Jason doesn’t think he’ll ever get enough of feeling Nico’s touch against him, or the sound of Nico’s breathing. Nico feels heavier and lax against him now.

“Time for bed?” Jason guesses. “You’ve done a lot of shadowtraveling.”

“Don’t remind me,” Nico mumbles, and he lifts his head again.

Jason meets him with another kiss. He’s never going to get enough of doing _that_ , either. His hands trace the smile lines of Nico’s cheeks, and the sound of Nico’s laughter just makes him want to kiss Nico more. Nico’s cheeks, Nico’s forehead, Nico’s jaw, Nico’s lips—he just wants it all.

Nico laughs again, securing Jason’s cheeks between his palms.

“So,” he muses gently, his charcoal eyes narrowing on Jason before the other demigod can keep going. Then he says something that Jason doesn’t expect: “Were you planning on taking the other bed, or did you want to push them together?”

*

There’s an empty trunk where Jason deposits his clothes. It’s strange to think about how most of his shirts and pants haven’t been touched in years, but at least he doesn’t have to go shopping anytime soon. They push two of the beds together, and Jason’s not sure what blows his mind more: that this is Nico’s suggestion, or how comfortable these beds are.

He's already sitting in bed when Nico comes out of the bathroom. Nico visibly pauses, staring up and down at Jason, and Jason suddenly feels self-conscious.

“I’ve been told I run warm,” Jason explains sheepishly, knowing full well he’s in nothing but his boxers. The only good thing about Cabin One was how drafty it was. Otherwise, Jason could go a millennium without ever having Hippie Zeus stare at his boxers again.

Nico tilts his head, his hair already tousled despite not hopping into bed. Jason wouldn’t have guessed the fluffy ghost slippers or long t-shirt and shorts, but here they are. Nico’s eyes remain glued to Jason, and he wonders if he should grab a shirt. Then, Nico sets his skull ring on the nightstand, looking amused.

“I run cold,” Nico warns, and he points to his black socks. He yawns again, and he plops into bed beside Jason, scooting closer than what Chiron allowed in the Big House. His arms hang off of Jason’s shoulders, and Jason’s arm folds over his boyfriend’s happily, like they belong there.

If someone told Jason two years ago that he’d die, come back to life, and go home with the boy that he was in love with, he doesn’t think he’d believe them. Everything about this feels like a dream—and the best gift of all is just how _happy_ he feels. Jason can’t think of anything better than falling asleep beside Nico.

“Can I take you out on a date?” Jason whispers. He runs a hand up Nico’s back, and sure enough, Nico feels cold against him.

Nico chuckles into his shoulder, and he raises his eyes to meet Jason. “What’d you have in mind?”

“Flowers, chocolate—the whole nine yards,” Jason quips immediately. “Maybe flying. A picnic? We could go down the boardwalk in Montauk. Or—there’s this bakery in New Rome, if you’re up for it, that makes the best brownies—”

“Jason,” Nico cuts him off, shushing him with a finger to the lips. Amusement flashes in his eyes. “Are we going on one date, or twelve?”

“I’m hoping you’ll let me take you on more than twelve, eventually.”

Nico stares back at him, one eyebrow arched in the air. Then his lips break into a smile, and—

“ _Oop—”_

Nico shoves Jason onto the bed with much more energy than expected, his weight firm against Jason’s own. Jason stares back up to dark eyes and black hair, surprised, while Nico’s hands are firm on his chest. Then, Nico is gentle again, folding his elbows over him, and his face close against Jason’s.

“I missed you,” Nico says simply, his voice so sweet and loving that Jason’s heart swells.

“I missed you too,” Jason whispers back. He scoots towards the middle of the bed, so there’s space for both of them, and Nico presses a cheek to his chest.

There’s a delicate silence, where Nico traces the veins of Jason’s forearm, while Jason leans into the sound of Nico’s breathing.

“So is that a yes?” he asks tiredly.

“To a date?”

“Yeah.”

Nico raises his head, evidently amused. “Yes, Jason, I’d love to go out on a date with you.”

Jason grins, and he thinks the flowers on the windowsill look just a little more vibrant. He traces Nico’s cheek with his fingers, then leans in for an umpteenth kiss that evening. He’s never going to get tired of kissing Nico.

The said demigod hums, cradling Jason’s hand against his own—and then he leans forward to deepen their kiss. A hand traces Jason’s collarbone delicately. There’s a tenderness to the way Nico grazes him—and it just hits Jason again that he’s _alive_ now and can feel the warmth of each of Nico’s touch. He can feel his own heartbeat, and he can kiss the boy he loves as many times as he wants.

Then the kissing gets heavier.

Nico peels away for a moment, and Jason admires just how handsome his boyfriend looks in the moonlight. His skin is cold, sure, but the shadows only highlight his narrow jaw and deepen the pools of his eyes. If Jason never left the presence of darkness, he thinks he’d be okay with Nico beside him. Nico holds Jason’s face in his hands as dearly as he cradles Jason’s heart, and the next kiss is heavier.

It takes him off guard, like Nico shoving him into the bed, but he openly welcomes it. it’s different from the light feathery kisses he’d given during the party—and definitely different from their kiss over the River Styx and Persephone’s Garden. Nico’s fingers pad across his jaw like they have plenty times earlier tonight—but now they feel like they’re dragging across his face. He straddles Jason at the hip. And—

“Oh,” Jason says, and he freezes with Nico’s body on top of his own, and his hands pause. He didn’t even realize they were under Nico’s shirt, until Nico shudders, which—“That’s new.”

Jason _feels_ different, too, and—he looks down between Nico’s legs, and his throat dries. That was different, too.

“What’s new?” Nico mumbles. His face is still very much close to his—close enough to feel Nico’s breath against his mouth. His pitch is low and husky, sending a chill up Jason’s spine. Then—maybe purposefully, maybe accidentally, Nico moves his hips, and the gentle graze of Nico’s erection against Jason’s own is like a bolt of lightning that makes Jason’s toes curl.

A breathy moan melts at Jason’s lips, and his hands fly to Nico’s thighs, trembling. “I—I’m not sure.”

But he definitely wants to do that again. It’s _different_ from everything else that Jason’s ever done with Piper, and he gasps as Nico presses further into him.

Then, regretfully, Nico sits back, the hooded look in his eyes disappearing in favor of studying Jason. He still looks cute, of course, but Jason’s mind is so frazzled from his own erection that he’s not sure how Nico can think straight.

“Have you…” Nico’s voice trails off. “Been with a guy before?”

“No,” Jason admits wholeheartedly, because that’s not the issue he’s having right now.

“But,” Nico says doubtfully, and Jason can already see Nico’s bulge receding, “you’re sure you’re into guys.”

“I think this speaks for itself,” Jason says, though his own erection is already going away with the shift in mood. He swallows, trying hard not to stare too much. He thinks he catches Nico staring too, which suddenly makes him feel more self-conscious than being half-naked did. Every bad sexual experience Jason’s had prior to this suddenly comes back to him and—yup, that boner is definitely not coming back tonight.

He's not sure if the panic shows on his face. Before he can relive the humiliation, Nico reaches out and presses a hand to his arm.

“Um,” Nico suddenly says, and under the moonlight, Jason thinks Nico is embarrassed, too. “We can go slower.”

“But I don’t want to go slow,” Jason blurts out—then again, Jason thinks he might have reached his limit for tonight. As perfect as the last two days have felt, his skin is now prickling, and he suddenly feels anxious. That evidently shows more on his face than the words that just flew out of his mouth.

Nico climbs over him this time, less intensely than before, and presses a kiss to Jason’s temple. It makes him feel better.

“Let’s start with that date,” Nico says, which somehow simultaneously calms Jason down and makes him feel even more nervous. “We have all the time in the world for all of the other…stuff.”

Jason sighs into Nico’s touch, and they settle back into cuddling. The familiar motions make the nervousness dwindle. He flushes red, slowly regaining the courage to run a hand across Nico’s shoulder blades. It’s lighter than moments ago.

“I want to do the other stuff,” Jason whispers, “just, uh. You might have to take the lead on it. Probably more than ‘ _might.’_ ”

“Mm,” Nico mutters into his chest. “There’s nothing wrong with that, Jason. So long as you’re into it.”

After a moment, hearing Nico’s breath slow, Jason realizes the son of Hades might actually be more tired than he let on. The kissing was fun, sure, but Nico’s probably right. The last couple of days have been very emotional, and—well, actually, maybe these new developments are _because_ he’s alive again.

Most importantly—Jason doesn’t think he’s ever been that _into_ touching someone before. Ever.

*

Cuddling is still comfortable for Jason. Between celebrating his eighteenth birthday, coming back to life, and also getting a boyfriend, it’s probably the most wonderful feeling in the world—holding Nico in his arms like he’s holding his heart, with his face buried in Nico’s hair, and their hands laced together. He feels like a puzzle piece clicking into place, with his own legs just curling around Nico’s like the arch of an unfinished picture.

Jason’s been in a dogpile, passed out in a pack of Lupa’s wolves before. After slaying Krios, Jason spent his last night in a heap of the remaining soldiers in the Fifth Cohort before he became praetor, passed out among his comrades and consumed in exhaustion. Piper, Leo, and he all but fell over each other on Festus during their first quest together, and there’d been at least one pile of passed out teenagers on the Argo II in between trying not to die.

Piper used to insist on sneaking into Cabin One in the middle of the night, but the stress of the impending war and trying to convince the Romans on their side hardly put Jason in the mood for cuddling, let alone the other reasons he ended up dreading.

This feels much more intimate. More than it was with Piper, and Jason doesn’t think he’s ever wanted to hold someone the way he’s holding Nico. When he was dead, there was never a hesitation.

He opens his eyes to the sight of Nico’s mussy hair and the sweet hum of his breath. Nico’s still in a deep slumber as far as he can tell, pressed up against Jason like a body to armor.

And then there’s _that_ feeling again, as Nico scoots into his warmth. Jason swallows hard, his gaze falling to his own body as Nico molds into his legs. There’s a quiet yawn and Nico stretches, the length of his figure curled up against Jason—and disappointingly, Nico turns around to face him, forehead pressed against Jason’s own before Jason can contemplate how _nice_ that feels.

Even asleep, Nico’s hands browse Jason like reaching out in a dream. Waking up like this reminds Jason that he’s no longer in the Underworld. That he’s alive, with the boy he’s had a crush on— _loved_ for months, and that none of this is dreams.

Jason’s eyes wander further down to Nico’s mouth, and he’s licking his lips before he knows it. And—that erection is definitely not going away.

He hears Nico hum, low and groggy, and Jason holds back another moan as Nico’s leg brushes up against him.

Jason forces himself to think about every possible boring thing in his life. It proves to be harder as he _gets_ harder, with Nico’s hands clamoring up his chest. It’s definitely not something he’s ever _had_ to do before.

Every boring thought feels sandwiched with Nico somehow—like sitting in his dorm room finishing physics homework, which was rewarded with designing temples, which reminds him how much he missed sitting in this very cabin watching Nico’s hand trace a map of the Underworld as they entertained the thought of building shrines for the Underworldly gods, which makes him think about Nico’s hands—and then the rest of Nico’s body, and Jason swallows hard, feeling his own morning wood ( _morning wood_?) twitch. Jason suddenly wants to run his hands over the rest of Nico’s body, like his legs, and his chest, and—that bulge pressed against his own hip, which unearths a little moan from Jason’s throat—a sound that he’s never heard himself make.

What makes his erection go away, like getting blasted by one of Khione’s icy gales, is Nico accidentally caressing one of the spots where Jason was stabbed.

Jason snaps into attention almost immediately, gripping Nico by the wrist. The tightness of his own grasp shocks Nico awake.

“Jason,” Nico starts sleepily. He raises his gaze slowly, and Jason’s aware that his grip of Nico’s hand is so tight that his knuckles are pale. Nico’s eyebrows furrow together, voice groggy, “what—?”

“Sorry,” Jason interjects, and then suddenly Nico isn’t focused on how tightly Jason is gripping him—but on Jason himself, which makes his own blood run cold. Yup—Boner: the Sequel went away with no middle, climax, or end, and Jason’s not sure if he’s relieved or more concerned.

Nico’s eyes narrow, and despite the fringe of hair sticking to his face and the bleariness only moments ago, Nico tries to look more awake. His gaze falls low—Jason has a brief panic that the gaze is going to fall _lower_ —but it stalls at his chest, then raises to their tense grip.

“Your heart’s beating really fast,” Nico says instead, and he jerks his hand gently for Jason to relinquish his grip. His expression softens. “Did you have a nightmare?”

It’d be an easy out to say yes, but Jason also thinks Nico may worry more. He presses his hand to where he was wounded, where not even a scar exists. He knows it makes sense—Hades was also nice enough to heal his eyes when he left the Underworld, but the phantom pain still exists. The thought of turning around and getting stabbed again suddenly makes him nauseous.

“I’m,” Jason starts slowly, “still get some phantom pains from Caligula stabbing me.”

Nico perks at this, his eyes widening in surprise, then his eyes flow to Jason’s pec. “Since how long?”

“Um. Just now?”

“Oh,” is all Nico can say, and he grimaces. “When you were holding my hand. Did I…?”

“You touched where he stabbed me,” Jason confesses, and it worries him that Nico’s face scrunches. His mind focuses on that instead, and Jason pushes himself into a sitting position immediately. Nico’s eyes are already looking on the spot where the spear pierced him, and Jason can almost envision it again. Getting stabbed and watching his shirt drench in his own blood. He reaches out with Nico’s hand and places it on his chest.

Nico stares back at him, concerned.

“You run cold,” Jason whispers. “That’s all.”

Nico still looks doubtful, but then his hand flattens against Jason’s chest, palm against heart. His demeanor softens, his other hand reaching out to lace in Jason’s. The worry slowly fades from his demeanor, and Nico looks more focused on something else.

“You run warm now,” Nico notes, and he curls his hand gently around the spot. Jason shudders, and Nico peers back up at him. “I like that.”

“Yeah,” Jason says, and he smiles. He embraces Nico’s grip under his own. “I like that too.”

Jason reaches out with a kiss. Nico kisses him back, raising his hand from Jason’s heart to around his shoulders, and there’s a vibration of a hum against Jason’s mouth. Before it can get as heavy as it did before, Jason climbs out of the bed and stretches. He misses the way Nico leaned further in but looks back in time to see the son of Hades blink in surprise.

“I’m going on a morning run,” Jason says, and he notices Nico’s gaze lingering on him. He suddenly wonders if sleeping in boxers was a terrible idea. “Do you want to come?”

Nico looks contemplative. He lifts a curtain to the pastel hue of the sky, then wrinkles his nose. He raises his arms to stretch, the lays back down. “I’ll pass.”

Jason laughs. “Piper used to say that too.”

“For good reason,” Nico retorts, and he’s already closing his eyes again, blanket pulled over his body. “Don’t think I don’t remember you pulling this when you were alive the first time. There’s absolutely no reason to be up before the sun.”

“No reason?” Jason echoes.

Nico opens one eye, looking every bit as sleepy as before. He stares at Jason contemplatively again.

“I want you to wake me up,” he says quietly, “if you have a nightmare about dying. If you have a nightmare about anything. I want—”

Nico’s hands curl against the duvet, and his expression looks as pained as it did the day they stood outside of Frank’s praetor house and yelled at each other.

“I want us to be able to talk to each other,” Nico finishes quietly. He lifts his gaze. “Okay?”

They didn’t talk to each other as much as they could have before Jason died. Maybe if they had, Jason would’ve stayed at Camp Halfblood, and he and Nico might’ve been together. But they’re together _now_ , and Jason doesn’t think he would’ve aired how he felt about his friends or just how strongly he felt about Nico if he hadn’t died. He feels comfortable too, with telling Nico how he feels. For the most part.

“Okay,” Jason says, and he kisses Nico on the forehead.

Nico catches him by the back of his head, an eyebrow arched in the air. “You sure you don’t want to stay in?”

His voice and body are making a very compelling argument—both for and against Jason’s growing predicament.

“Can’t make me break my habits that easily, di Angelo,” Jason teases, and he presses another kiss to his boyfriend’s disappointed face. Then, he throws on a shirt and shorts. Nico watches him the entire time, and he can’t help but wonder if Nico’s disappointed.

When he’s finally out of Cabin Thirteen, Jason lets out a sigh of relief.

*

Running around camp helps. It’s familiar to Jason—something where he can control the movement of his body, where he knows just how many laps it’ll take before he starts to sweat (and when that happens, he adds an extra five or six laps to his current eight), and relishes in the burn of his lungs. It reminds him he’s _alive_ again, and Jason can only grin through his perspiration.

He thinks the sun is especially warm as it greets him, like Apollo is celebrating the fact that he’s alive. Campers raise their head to do a double take towards the end of Jason’s run, and he greets them with a wave. Percy flashes a grin when they see each other and they high-five.

When Jason finishes his run, he makes his way past the infirmary to get to Cabin Thirteen. He stops when he catches glimpse of Nico in the window talking idly to Connor Stoll and Will Solace. Connor raises his gaze from Nico, taps the son of Hades on the shoulder immediately, and then all three of them stare back at Jason.

Jason panics.

They know.

Somehow, they know.

They definitely know.

He feels the same prickling anxiety from last night as he stalls at the entrance of the infirmary. It’s a familiar sensation from way back—when Piper and he were dating and he was more certain than not that other people knew back then, too.

Because Piper _definitely_ told people, and people _definitely_ stared at Jason oddly, and he’d hoped those awkward memories would have just stayed dead and buried instead of resurrecting _with_ him.

Literally nothing happened below the belt last night, and Nico seemed as embarrassed as Jason felt. But—for an entirely different reason. Still, Jason feels the cold paranoia in the back of his neck that people just _know_ and Nico just told the two demigods in the infirmary with him, just like Piper told Annabeth, and suddenly Jason feels more nauseous after his run than relief.

“Hey,” Nico greets him before Jason can collect his thoughts. He’s at the entrance of the infirmary with a smile on his face, but immediately it fades when they’re standing parallel to each other. “You look pale. What’s wrong?”

Jason’s gaze is still glued on Will and Connor. Will, of course, raises an eyebrow at him, unperturbed. He offers a salute that Jason can’t muster a response to.

“What were you guys talking about?” Jason asks.

Nico’s follows Jason’s gaze. He turns back, confused. “Connor and I were telling Will that you’re alive.”

Oh. Jason’s still doubtful. He can see Will tapping Connor’s shoulder, and now both of them look at him. Before he can start speculating, Nico steps into his line of sight, and the frown on his face deepens.

“Is,” Nico asks slowly, “this about last night?”

Yes. No. Maybe more than last night. Definitely more than about last night.

“Jason.” Nico snaps Jason out of his thoughts before they burn a hole in his head. Then Nico flashes a look, his eyebrows shriveling together. He looks around briefly, where Jason’s vaguely aware that the number of campers is sparse. His voice is low. “I didn’t tell anyone. What happens between us is _our_ business.”

He looks hurt, and Jason feels like an idiot. After a warm night of being alive again, and Nico’s hopes of their relationship—and all of the months where Jason fell for this boy before he died, he knows he should give Nico the benefit of the doubt.

“This is all me,” Jason says weakly, and he backs away for a moment. He wipes the sweat on his brow with the collar of his t-shirt.

“It’s okay.” Nico replies slowly, and his voice is still low, “if you don’t have experience in this department. With guys. I mean—you and Piper were together for a long time. I—”

A thoughtful flicker flashes over Nico’s eyes, and Jason’s not quite sure what’s going on in the son of Hades’s head.

“I want us to go at a pace that’s comfortable for both of us.” Red flourishes over Nico’s cheeks, and he crosses his arms over his chest. He clears his throat, taking a flustered step back and Jason’s own embarrassment diminishes. “I might’ve—I _was_ —eager last night. We can take it slow. We _should_ take this slow.”

“Nico, I don’t want to go slow,” Jason says. He reaches outward and places hands on either side of his boyfriend’s shoulders. Nico peers back up with a mixture of unease and hope, and Jason thinks his own face is probably the same. “I—it’s me.”

Nico’s eyebrows furrow together, doubtful.

“We can talk about it tonight.” Jason curls his hands around Nico’s own and flashes a hopeful look. “Can I take you out on that date?”

Nico stares at him skeptically.

“Please?” Jason begs.

Finally, Nico forfeits, and he nods. “Fine, but I’m holding you to it.”

With a smile, Jason presses a kiss to Nico’s cheek and bids him goodbye.

*

Of course, now that Jason promised that they would talk, he has to figure out what words to string together.

Much like back then, he doesn’t know who he would talk to about it. Leo rolled his eyes every time the subject of Piper and he came up. He never seemed comfortable with them as a couple. Now that Piper and Leo are dating, it makes _sense_ , and it’s even less of a reason for Jason to talk about past sexual endeavors.

Percy’s a _choice_ , but Jason’s not sure if that’s the _right_ choice, and doubts Nico would be happy if he got their resident son of Poseidon involved in their personal lives. Annabeth and he extended an olive branch towards each other—but as smart as she is, Jason doesn’t want her thoughts when it comes to his body. Frank would probably be nice about it, but Jason doesn’t think his current predicament is worth tearing Praetor Zhang away from Legion training. And Hazel—well, she’s up there with Thalia as reasons why Jason wouldn’t want to talk about what happened last night and what _hasn’t_ happened before.

The first two people who he crossed off his list, of course, find him under Thalia’s tree, cross-legged and tossing apples at Peleus.

Piper and Leo smile at him warmly.

“Bro, I don’t think I’m ever get used to the sight of you alive,” Leo says, and they plop across from him, hand-in-hand.

Jason peers back up at his best friend and flashes a sentimental look. “Same.”

Leo grins back sheepishly while Piper punches him.

“You two only get to scare me like that once,” she warns, “don’t do it again.”

“Yes ma’am,” both Leo and Jason reply, and she smiles at them. For a moment, Jason forgets his current debacle and gets to enjoy the company of his best friends before they head back to Indianapolis at the end of the summer.

Between working in the infirmary with Will Solace and teaching classes, Jason knows Nico is busy. Jason’s just happy to be a part of this life that Nico has built while he was gone. People are too busy gawking at the fact Jason is alive to take him up on his offer to teach sword-training classes, so he’s stuck dreading this date instead.

“So,” Leo suddenly says, waving smarmy eyebrows, “we saw Cabin One was empty. Where’d you sleep last night?”

“Nico’s Cabin,” Jason replies, and he gives it a second thought. “I guess it’s my cabin now, too.”

“I knew it!” Piper says, and she grins in a way that makes him uncomfortable.

“You _dog_ ,” Leo says, and he punches Jason playfully in the arm in the same way Piper moved earlier. “Beds together or apart?”

“Together,” Jason answers absentmindedly. He has to smile at how supportive both his best friends are, considering how far they’ve come in the last couple days alone. They both grin at each other, as happy as they were the day before when Nico and he walked into his eighteenth birthday party hand-in-hand. Then his smile fades and his knee rocks nervously against the ground.

“Anything happen last night?” Leo asks, still wiggling his eyebrows jokingly.

Jason’s leg stops shaking. He rubs his own fingers and his gaze falls before he can help it. “Um. Something happened.”

“ _Something_?” Leo echoes, his grin growing like Jason’s nervousness.

“Something,” Jason repeats. He pauses and lifts his gaze back to his best friends. Piper isn’t smiling the way Leo is anymore.

“Leo,” Piper says, and she gently places a hand on her boyfriend’s shoulder. “Can you give Jason and I a minute?”

This time, Leo’s smile fades and he’s suddenly staring at them in confusion. Jason blinks, also puzzled, but Piper looks certain. Then he feels uncomfortable, his demeanor twisting with his emotions.

“Everything okay, Superman?” Leo asks worriedly.

“Um,” is all Jason say, and his eyebrows knit together.

“Everything’s fine,” Piper reassures, though her own expression is skeptical. “Just some unresolved issues from the past.”

_Issues_ isn’t quite the word that Jason wants to hear. He grimaces, and Leo looks even less inclined to leave. But then Piper flashes her boyfriend a look, and it occurs to Jason she’s doing that instead of opening her mouth with the risk of charmspeak. Jason hasn’t felt fuzzy-headed or bleary since being alive again, like back when they were dating. Maybe because he’s so in love with Nico now.

“Alright, but I’m here too,” Leo reminds them, and he flashes a pointed look at Jason. Piper kisses him gingerly on the mouth, evoking a cheery smile from the son of Hephaestus, and Jason can’t help feeling as happy for the couple as they were for him. Then, Leo makes the trek towards Bunker Nine.

Piper’s eyes are already back on Jason before Leo is out of sight. “So something happened?”

Jason makes another face and crosses his arms thoughtfully. He’s very much in love with his current (and hopefully only, ever) boyfriend, but the way that Piper looks at him just makes him nervous. She studies him, as caring as Nico was earlier, and all of those anxieties just reap back up. Piper waits for him to speak up anyway.

“Something happened,” Jason repeats nervously. He hesitates before gesturing in the vague vicinity of his crotch. “I, uh. Reacted.”

“Reacted how?”

Red flourishes in Jason’s cheeks. “I _reacted_ , Pipes.”

“Re…oh. _Oh._ ” Piper’s suddenly red too, and he’s keenly aware of her eyes falling down to the space between his legs. Somewhere she stared previously and often got frustrated with. “Well, that’s new.”

“Yeah.” Jason smiles painfully, and his lips ache. “That’s what I said.”

He gauges Piper’s reaction. Being unable to have sex was just another way that he was never able to please her. Another reason why Piper was sure they weren’t real, no matter how much Jason insisted he loved her. Which had always been an ego-bruiser for him.

Silena’s words echo in his mind. Their relationship never had depth to it—not with Juno’s meddling, and everything going on with the war. Jason’s insistence that he loved Piper feels different now compared to how he utters the same words to Nico. Maybe it was always different.

Jason forgot all about the stressful things in his old relationship—the ones that were easily overshadowed by building the Argo II, getting through the Second Giant War—getting through the inevitable fate of dying—that felt much easier than trying to figure out why he wasn’t as receptive as Piper wanted.

Piper doesn’t look angry. Jason never expected this conversation to crop back up, especially since he’d _died_ , so they’re both feeling awkward.

“Um…congrats?” she offers.

“I guess?” Jason replies uncertainly.

“Did it go anywhere?”

“No.” Jason rips some grass and a flower blooms in its place. He flushes red. “I mean, I wanted it to.”

Which, of course, goes up there with new things that Jason has experienced since coming back to life.

He hears Piper hum, and she awkwardly fiddles with the dirt. At first, he thinks she’s trying not to let it bother her. It took him a long time to pick up on the fact that mentioning Reyna bothered her when they were dating. Based on the way Annabeth and Hazel would roll their eyes, Jason considered it was just a _guy_ thing, but in his mind, he never had to separate the people that he cared about.

Jason had a hard time thinking about _a lot_ of people romantically. Jason thought Piper held his heart—but maybe it _was_ just the mist. Just Aphrodite and Hera messing with them, and placing too much pressure on them.

“I don’t want to make you mad,” Jason says slowly, and he’s surprised by how Piper immediately cocks her head back up.

She looks conflicted, but then she pushes a scrap of hair behind her.

“I used to think I _would_ be mad if you… _reacted_ with another girl,” Piper admits. She turns her head slowly in the direction of Bunker Nine, and the anxiety Jason used to feel about disappointing her immediately disappears. Her demeanor twists. “But that was so long ago. I think we can both agree that I wasn’t the best girlfriend.”

“There were good moments,” Jason protests.

“They weren’t all good,” Piper retorts. She makes another face, as though wincing at their old relationship. “The worst thing I ever did was make our relationship about me and not about us. And—for all of the focus that was on our relationship, there wasn’t enough focus on you.”

Jason shifts uncomfortably in his seat. He suddenly doesn’t want _any_ focus on him.

“I’m… _glad_ that you were able to get…hard?” Each tentative thought is punctuated with a question mark. Piper heave a sigh and presses a hand to her forehead, red in her cheeks.

“This is a weird conversation,” Jason says, smiling awkwardly, “isn’t it?” He can’t think of anything more awkward and embarrassing than talking to his ex-girlfriend about their old sex issues.

“Gods, yes,” Piper mutters, but she immediately looks back up, her eyes radiating with concern. “But we shouldn’t stop because of me. This is about you, and what happened between you and Nico. My feelings aren’t necessary for this conversation.”

Jason leans back, contemplative. He thinks back to what Nico said earlier. “I think what happens between him and me needs to stay between us.”

Piper looks as reluctant at the dismissal as Leo did earlier, but she nods. “That’s for the best.”

“But I—” Jason swallows hard and he looks down to his feet. “—I don’t want what happened between us to happen between him and me, you know?”

To his surprise, Piper snorts. “I think you’re already off to a great start, Jason. Don’t you think?”

Red glows in Jason’s cheeks again as Piper emphatically points to his crotch.

She smiles at him. “Did you like it?”

“I—yeah. I did.” Jason grows quiet, his eyebrows knitting together. “But what if it doesn’t happen again?”

“Has it not happened since last night?”

“It did,” Jason says, and his cheeks burn darker. “Um, this morning.”

Piper looks like she wants to smirk, but she shakes her head. There’s no hostility there.

“I just don’t want it to be a problem between him and me,” Jason admits. “Like it was between us.”

Her smile fades, looking guiltier. Then she reaches out and places a hand over his. “There was _a_ lot going on that didn’t make _us_ work, Jason. Most— _all_ of it was me.”

“Not all of it.”

“ _All of the reasons you felt bad_ ,” Piper reiterates, and she frowns, “was because of me. And because of the charmspeak. How I’ve seen you act with Nico is different from our relationship. Leo and I—it’s different from our relationship, too. Maybe you and Nico just click better. I can tell that he listens to you. I—” She cringes. “I—was pretty bad at that.”

Jason considers her words. “He said that he wanted for us to be able to talk.”

“Then you already know what you need to do.”

“What if he doesn’t want to _be_ with me after I tell him?”

“Jason, he went to the Underworld and brought you back to life.” Piper stares at him in disbelief. “If that’s not indicative of how he feels, what is?”

For some reason, Jason’s chest tingles. He thinks back to how Nico brushed up against him this morning, noting the way he was warm while Nico was cold—and just how endearingly Nico had smiled at him. Nothing made him happier than waking up with Nico in his arms this morning, and a part of him just _knows_ that Nico felt the same way. There’s no doubt in his mind.

“Okay,” Jason says finally, and he _hopes_ that Piper is right.

*

Back when he was alive the first time, Jason had a list of places jotted down in his sketch book of where he wanted to take Nico. Once Will Solace asked for dating advice, Jason’s mind wandered with every stroke. He wondered about all the ways he could make Nico smile as easily as he did behind the four walls of Cabin Thirteen and continue that feeling of easiness.

Jason gets to fly them to Long Island Sound as the sun sets, and he relishes in the feeling of Nico’s hand on his chest and Nico’s hair tickling his nose. There’s a lot more physical touch between them—more than when they wore armor for Capture the Flag. He still remembers the first time they were in the air like this—and just how much Nico was ready to put space between them.

Nico’s hand is propped against the small of his back, and the way Jason’s hand is on Nico’s waist is far more intimate than trying to hunt down Favonius. It’s _different_ , like Piper said, and that makes him feel a little better.

When they land, Jason soaks in the sight of Nico’s hair in different directions. Nico combs a hand through his own locks and picks out a leaf.

Nico stares at him, an eyebrow arched in the air. “Why are you smiling?”

“That was my first time flying again,” Jason explains. “And I got to do it with you.” 

His boyfriend stares back at him, amused, then a smile curls against his own lip. “You’re a sap.”

“Got a problem with it?”

“I never said that.” Nico reaches and kisses him on the cheek, then they start scaling a cluster of rocks out into the ocean.

Jason feels the ocean water as it flicks across his face and soaks in the scent of the sea breeze. His favorite part, of course, is watching the pastel hue of the sky dim as the sun greets the moon and bids the summer dusk goodbye. When they settle onto a rock, feet dangling over the water, Jason seeks out Nico’s warmth.

“First time seeing the Long Island sky again?”

Jason peels away from a moment, surprised. “How’d you guess?”

“Just a guess,” Nico muses, and despite the wryness of his tone, he reaches out and thumbs Jason’s cheek. They kiss against the sea breeze, with the colors of the summer evening softening under the sunset. No matter how alive Jason actually is, kissing Nico makes him feel weightless.

“I love you,” Jason says. He curls his hand around Nico’s, foreheads pressed together. Off in the distance, Jason wouldn’t be surprised if his cloud nine bloomed in a field of flowers. 

Nico only smiles. “I love you too.”

Jason doesn’t think there’s anything as fulfilling than knowing that Nico is smiling for _him._

“Are you ready to talk about last night?”

Right. Jason’s stomach sinks and his smile fades. Before he can dwell too long, Nico reaches out and laces their hands together. Jason peers back up and is met with the look of worry in Nico’s eyes. It’s the same gaze that Nico gave him when they were crossing the River Styx, filled with concern and adoration. When Nico insisted that Jason needed to be a part of his life, and where Jason professed that he wanted nothing more than wanted to grow old together.

Nico also chastised him for never being honest with himself, either.

Jason clears his throat, his hand tightening around Nico’s. A moment passes. Two. Each heartbeat feels agonizingly slow as it passes. “I’ve never had sex before.”

“Oh.” Nico sounds surprised. He waits, thoughtful, and then shrugs. “So you’re a virgin. There’s nothing wrong with that—”

“No. I’ve. I’ve _tried_ having sex before,” Jason says, and his cheeks are red. He fiddles with some pebbles and he lets the mortifying memories pass through his head. “Piper and I…there were times where we were alone and we _tried_ , but I could never get hard.”

He's afraid to look. Jason can _tell_ that Nico’s staring at him, but he doesn’t want to _know_ what exactly is going through Nico’s mind.

But, Nico is supportive, and he makes the conscious effort to place a hand on a knee in Jason’s line of sight. When Jason finally gathers the nerve to look back up, he notices that Nico is already leaning in and holding him again, like they’re one unit.

“You,” Nico starts slowly, and his cheeks brush just the slightest tinge of pink, “didn’t seem to have that problem last night.”

“Yeah, uh.” Jason feels his own face flourish. “That was new for me.”

Nico’s eyebrows cock slightly, and Jason recalls uttering the same exact phrase last evening.

“I never gave it much thought,” Jason confesses, and he recounts the bits and pieces of his first life. “I mean—no one ever seemed interested in me past my dad back at Camp Jupiter. And—when you’re a centurion, you break up a lot of kids making out. It’s not like it’s new to me. And then the first war happened where I slayed Krios. Then Percy and I got swapped, and I was busy getting my memories back. Juno preached so much about how I needed to be a leader that I spent so much time trying to learn about Greek traditions—I even watched this old VHS orientation video in Chiron’s office and took notes.”

He pauses for a moment because he thinks he sees Nico perk. Nico keeps his gaze on Jason, giving HIM a light squeeze on the arm to continue.

“In all that time with Piper, it never occurred to me that she’d want more than to cuddle and kiss, you know? We were preparing for a war.” Jason remembers the odd looks people on the Argo II would give him. Or how people at camp would tell him he was too serious. He’d chalked it up to his militant upbringing because it’s _important_ to him to feel stable. Even sitting through sex ed at Camp Jupiter felt like an aside to an impending war to dethrone Krios. “And then we _tried_ because I thought it’d make her happy, and it ended up making things worse.”

There’s a stark memory that Jason thinks Piper was wincing at earlier. When they were alone in Cabin One, with this beautiful girl below him as he tried to touch himself, but he was already so frustrated for being unable to get it up that he reasoned _that_ was why he couldn’t get hard. He stroked himself raw that night while Piper impatiently waited, and nothing changed. Jason also reasoned that it was weird trying to have sex in front of Hippie Zeus. Piper was skeptical.

“You’re a son of Jupiter,” she insisted, crossing her arms over her bare chest. “This should be cake for you.”

In that moment, he had the brief memory of the first time Piper insisted he unhook her bra. She had assured him that she didn’t mind fooling around. She was nice and soft, but Jason was happier to please Piper than he cared to touch her. For all of the routines and leadership roles he grew up with, she always had to move his hands for him.

And being told that getting a boner and having sex should be _easy_ for him definitely hurt. It was just another slap in the face and a different way he was disconnected from his own father. Jason always tried to stand as tall as the Jupiter Optimus Maximus, knowing one day he’d be leading an army like his father led the Olympians. In every achievement of Jason’s climb, the peak to his father’s acknowledgement grew taller and further away. Piper’s words threw him into a deep trench that both pierced his heart and his mentality.

He tells Nico as much, his voice miserable as he thinks through the memory.

“We never really figured that part out,” Jason says quietly. “And—she told Annabeth. I know she did. Annabeth already didn’t like me very much since I was Roman and Percy was gone.”

He’ll never forget how Annabeth’s look changed the day after their (attempted) first time. Piper and she were close, despite the fact their Wise Girl wasn’t keen of _his_ presence. She’d given him odd looks when she thought he didn’t notice, and Piper had grown increasingly more accusatory about his past (nonexistent) relationship with Reyna.

“Jason,” Nico says after a long, excruciating silence, “that’s a lot.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“No. I’m glad you told me.” Nico’s expression morphs, his eyebrows knitting together with worry. His hand hasn’t left Jason’s. He grows quiet. “You were there for me in Split. I told you: I want us to be able to talk to each other.”

His expression darkens and he turns so they’re facing each other.

“I don’t want to go through another lifetime where you can’t say how you feel.” Nico’s voice grows strained. “Or where we’re not together.”

Jason stares in disbelief. “You don’t think I’m weird?”

To his surprise, an ebony eyebrow darts in the air. “Weirder than a gay demigod from the 1940s coming to the twenty-first century? And bringing his ghost boyfriend back to life?”

“But I’m a _son of Jupiter_ ,” Jason insists, and he feels worse saying it.

The tattoos on his arm is a _burden_.

Even without his memories, he couldn’t forget the excruciating pain of getting branded and knowing his life was just an appeasement for the Queen of the Gods. He held her favor, which was more than other children of the King of the Gods could say.

“Of all things I can do—summoning lightning and blowing winds, getting my _body_ to work should be a nonissue,” Jason continues. “I already stuck out with the Romans, and I never fit in with the Greeks, and I—you know I wasn’t happy in Elysium. I shouldn’t be so—I keep trying to be perfect for my dad, and something’s _wrong_ every step of the way.”

Nico only stares back at him, the concern unwavering, Nico doesn’t look fazed at the mention of Jason’s dad. “You don’t need to be perfect, Jason. You just need to be you.”

Jason’s argument dies in his throat. Part of him had wondered if this was one of the reasons why Zeus was able to dismiss him so easily in Athens. For all of the things that Jason achieved in his father’s name, this was something he just _couldn’t_ achieve. Now, he stares at Nico, and having his own boyfriend’s approval matters _more_ than his father ever did.

“Perfect,” Nico continues, and he reaches out to stroke Jason’s cheek again, “is what made you think it was okay to sacrifice yourself in the name of the greater good. Perfect made you leave because you didn’t want to ruin our relationship.”

He pauses, and the expression on Nico’s face reminds Jason of this morning. Of the sadness in Nico’s eyes as he traced where the spear pierced through Jason.

“Perfect killed you,” Nico says quietly. “You deserve to be yourself. Just you.”

“Oh.” Jason swallows hard. He’s crying before he realizes it, the image of Nico blurring in front of him.

He’s cried so much in the last couple of days to the point of embarrassment, but Nico doesn’t seem to mind. Before Jason can avert his gaze, Nico cradles his face. Jason catches the stars in the pools of Nico’s eyes, and the reflection of his own relief. Then he feels Nico’s touch brush away the tears at the corners of Jason’s eyes.

“I love you,” Nico whispers, “because of all the things _you’ve_ done for me. Not the things you’ve done in the name of your dad. Besides—”

The corner of Nico’s mouth lifts.

“Weren’t you just saying how much you impressed _my_ dad?” Nico asks. He caresses Jason’s cheeks. “You did that yourself. You impressed the King of the Dead enough to _come back to life. You._ ”

Jason heaves a heavy breath, and his shoulders slack. The relief is palpable now, and every bit of prickling anxiety from the night before seems to diminish. He wipes his tears with his forearm and presses his head into Nico’s shoulder. “I love you too.”

He _really, really_ loves Nico, and wants to shout it to the heavens.

Nico presses a soft kiss to his forehead, and then all Jason feels is a hand caressing his back. _This_ is perfect. Them.

*

“So you and Piper never had sex?” Nico asks a little later when Jason calms down. They walk across the beach, hand-in-hand with their bare feet tapping in the sand.

“No,” Jason admits, and he finds himself having an easier time talking about it now. He waves his shoes in his hands, wiggling his ring and pinky fingers. “I got pretty good at improvising.”

He thinks the explanation suffices, but as he takes the strides forward, Nico reels him back. Nico has one eyebrow arched in the air. “Did you now?”

“I have a mouth and hands,” Jason assures, and his cheeks flush red recalling the temporary medium that Piper and he were able to come to before they broke up. “Piper seemed to like it enough. She always felt weird that she couldn’t return the favor. She tried. More than once.”

Nico’s brow furrows, and his own expression is pink. He peers back up, one eyebrow arched in the air. “But…last night…?”

“Very new,” Jason repeats, and he knows he’s even redder than before. “Um. I’d like to try that again eventually. If you do.”

He sees Nico’s gaze fall from his eyes, slowly, over Jason’s body, and very pointedly to his crotch.

“You told me you didn’t like guys any less because you were with Piper,” Nico says slowly. “What are the chances that you just like guys more?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Are you sure?”

“It’s different,” Jason insists, and he finds a comfortable mound of sand for both of them to plop on. “Piper and I talked about it. She said her relationship with Leo felt different than with me. Being with you feels different from being with Piper.”

“Because I’m a boy,” Nico guesses.

“Because you’re _you_ ,” Jason corrects, and he watches as Nico blinks in surprise. A smile curls against his lips and he pats the sand beside him. Nico is reluctant, but he sits beside Jason, their thighs touching. “I was always worried about trying to be that boyfriend the Mist gave Piper. It…was _exhausting_. But all that time you and I spent together—”

Jason caresses Nico’s hand gently. For all the time that Jason dwelled on the issue at hand, professing his love just feels _easy._ Nico made Jason’s feelings important.

“—felt effortless,” Jason continues. “Every memory of you and is what kept me going in the Underworld. Building temples together. Hanging out and stuff. I don’t have to think about being _perfect_ with you, I just want to make you happy. I _want_ to be with you.”

Nico’s eyebrows knit together, and he looks as touched as Jason felt earlier, when the sun was still streaking through the sky.

“I don’t know if there’s a word for it,” Jason confesses. He gestures to himself below the belt, red dusting across his cheeks, and smiles sheepishly. “But I know feeling so connected to you is why… _that_ happened.”

Nico’s head falls to his shoulder.

Um. “Nico?”

“You’re so cheesy,” Nico whispers, and he raises his head, a smile curled against his lips.

Jason smiles back. “Got a problem with it?”

“No,” Nico reaffirms, and he molds his hands behind Jason’s head. He leans in for a kiss, and after such an emotional night, Jason happily welcomes it.

They’re light and sweet, like they have been since his birthday. Jason can feel the love and adoration in each of Nico’s touches, as cold hands pad his jaw. He wants Nico to feel all of his heart, and just how _grateful_ Jason feels to have this second chance so they can be together and be _them._

Then the kisses get heavy again.

Jason instigates it before he realizes it, the gentle graze of his hands against Nico’s cheeks dragging instead, and his breath weighty in his throat. Nico’s hands seem to scrape through his hair and a moan flutters from Jason’s mouth.

They’re buried in the sand before he realizes it, Nico’s hair splaying against the beach ground.

Jason pauses, recognizing the same sensation rising between his legs. He peels away for a moment, met with the sight of plum red in Nico’s cheeks and the lidded gaze from the night before. Gods.

“You’re so pretty,” Jason whispers, and he’s aware that his hands are framing Nico’s face.

Nico tilts his head in the sand, a glowing sheen against his lips, and an eyebrow arched in amusement. He drops his leg, which brings Jason closer to him. Another breathy moan flutters from Jason’s throat as his erection presses up against Nico’s.

Jason’s new favorite sound? Nico sighing hoarsely in his ear.

“Oh,” is all Jason can say, and he clamors over Nico, pleasantly relishing in the way Nico shudders. “Um—you want to go home?”

Nico blinks, his hands folded over the back of Jason’s neck.

Jason flushes. “To continue this?”

Nico lets out another shaky breath, which Jason assumes has to do with the way he’s suddenly fiddling with Nico’s hipbone. “You sure?”

Nothing sounds better than hearing Nico’s moan—or _feels_ better than his boyfriend pressed against him. “I _really_ want to.”

A sigh falls from Nico’s mouth and up against Jason ear, and out of instinct, Jason can feel his hands curl.

They kiss one last time on the Long Island Sound beach—then Nico shadowtravels them back to Cabin Thirteen.

*

Jason didn’t think there was anything more intense than declaring how much he wanted to grow old with the boy he was in love with, as Nico shined under candlelight and they watched paper sailboats course through a river of hopes and dreams. He didn’t think he could be any _happier_ , than holding Nico in a storm of his own fruition, with flowers exhuming from the dirt and fruit harvesting in trees as they splashed around the gardens.

There’s a _new_ intensity, and a _new_ happiness as Nico shadowtravels them back to Hades Cabin. There’s an _eagerness_ that Jason’s never felt before, and his hands just fly across the surface of Nico’s skin, fervent and in search of every line and divot of Nico’s body.

The fact that Nico can just _shadowtravel_ them straight back into Cabin Thirteen _totally_ makes flying lame, and Jason’s inclined to agree with Persephone that their dad isn’t as cool as the King of the Gods thinks he is.

Jason has been in combat before. He’s been pressed up against enemies, seething with the thought of his own mortality at the back of his head.

Time doesn’t matter with Nico pressed up against him. Jason’s head is warm, and his entire body feels livid. Nico’s arms are knotted around Jason’s shoulders, which just _feels_ different from lacing their fingers together. It’s stronger than flying down to Long Island Sound, where Nico had an arm on the small of Jason’s back. They’re far past the two boys trying to trust one another after Diocletian’s Palace.

And—knowing just how dearly Nico held their relationship _since_ Split, just makes Jason want to hold Nico closer.

They stand parallel to each other, exploring. Jason doesn’t think his lips have parted from Nico since leaving Long Island Sound. He’s eager to hear whatever else he can illicit from his boyfriend, and he’s tangibly aware of the hands that are dragging across his shoulder blades beneath his varsity jacket.

Nico tugs them towards the bed, and Jason find them in the same position as they were in the sand: Nico pressed up against the mattress, ebony hair pooling against the bed sheets, and Jason pushed up against him.

They part for a moment—which is when Jason realizes he’s got a greater lung capacity than his boyfriend. He’s met with the sight of red as it paints across Nico’s pale cheeks and tapers down Nico’s jaw, beneath the three camp beads on Nico’s clavicle. Jason takes in the sight of the rise and fall of his boyfriend’s chest, and he _knows_ it’s different from his own breathing this morning when he ran around Camp Halfblood.

Then, Nico reaches up with both his hands, crowning the back of Jason’s head like this morning, but the intent is clearer. He tilts his head against the folds of the bedsheets, hair swaying as he does so, and despite the sudden upstart in the pace of their relationship, Nico somehow manages to look warm and caring beneath the heat of his eyes.

“You good?” Nico whispers.

Jason buries himself into Nico’s body, grinding his own erection against his boyfriend’s. Nico’s moan is decadent in Jason’s ears, and Jason watches the sight of Nico’s head tilting back in response, like an extension of Jason’s own body.

“I’ve,” Jason breathes, “never been better.”

They lock lips again, and Jason seeks out the taste of Nico’s mouth in his own. He feels Nico’s leg hook into the back of his thigh, and in one sweep, Jason is rocking against Nico.

_“Oh_ ,” he hears himself say, but his moan pales in comparison to the sight of Nico’s head bobbling back and his eyes fluttering shut. Nico’s hands are fisting the back of his shirt now, little creases appear between his brow. The strength of Nico’s leg is strong, an ankle digging into Jason’s leg. Jason sees stars in his eyes as they rub against each other again, and the pleasure shoots from his cock through the rest of his body, like lightning crackling through the sky.

It's a storm mixing in Jason’s body as he squeezes his eyes shut and pivots himself into Nico. Bolts of pleasure just jolt through Jason, and Nico’s breath is heavy in his ears.

“ _Gods_ ,” Jason gasps, and he’s whimpering as he _feels_ Nico’s legs wrap around them to bring them close. Nico’s fingers pad his jaw before bringing him close into another kiss that Jason could just drown in. Nico rolls his hips, and the pleasure just grows.

Jason relished in being able to _hold_ Nico, but now he’s gripping onto his boyfriend like holding life itself and grating against Nico as the pleasure surges in him and spreads to the tips of his fingers, and just _rings_ in his ears. Jason’s own throat stings from moaning and gasping.

He just wants to keep _going_ , every time he hears the sound of his own boyfriend’s pleasure. He wants to _keep_ thrusting and _keep_ grinding and _keep_ feeling Nico’s hands as they rifle beneath him.

_“Jason_ ,” Nico whispers, and Jason’s mind just stalls. _“I—gods—”_

Jason comes with a shuddery breath, stars burning in the corners of his eyes, and everything goes white.

*

Jason’s seen enough movies to have an _idea_ of what’s supposed to happen post-orgasm. He imagines a lot of cuddling and pillow talk, murmuring sweet words until they fell asleep once they reaffirmed how much they loved each other.

Right now, Jason feels warm and sticky. In his varsity jacket, he suddenly understands why most people strip to _some_ degree when having sex. His face is wet and hot, and he can feel the heat in his own cheeks. His body feels heavy, and his pants are drenched…in more ways than one.

“Um,” Jason mumbles, and he’s surprised at how hoarse he sounds, “did you…?”

He stares down at his boyfriend, and Nico’s hair looks more of a mess now than gliding through the sky. His shirt is stretched—Jason doesn’t even know when that happened. Nico is still heaving, the red still pertinent in his pale cheeks. Jason sees his own dazed reflection reflected in Nico’s eyes—and he sees the same lull in Nico’s face.

Then there’s a smile, soft and lackadaisical as Nico raises his head and brushes his lips over Jason’s. “Yeah. You?”

“That was a lot,” Jason says, and he can’t quite get his voice above a groggy whisper.

Nico kisses him again, then mirth flickers in his eye. “It certainly was.”

“What?” Jason asks. He follows Nico’s line of sight as his boyfriend gestures down—and then—“Oh.”

The _drenched_ feeling suddenly makes sense, with the apparent dark spots in his jeans. Jason’s arms finally give out on him, and he rolls onto his back, letting the numbness tingle at the back of his head, too. There’s a singeing scent that wafts in his nostrils.

“I think you might’ve electrocuted me.”

“I did?” Jason asks, and his cheeks flourish. There’s a dark trail of burnt fingerprints in one of Nico’s sleeves. Jason can hardly bring himself to lift his head. “Oh, sorry.”

Nico laughs softly, and Jason can’t tell if he likes _that_ more or the way Nico had mewled in his ear just moments ago. They almost feel incomparable. He sits up with much more nimbleness than Jason can muster and presses a kiss to Jason’s forehead. “How about a shower?”

“Oh. Yeah.” It takes all Jason’s remaining energy to climb to feet.

The shower is already running when Jason can direct himself towards the bathroom. Semen smears Jason’s leg as he chucks off his pants, body suddenly cold and drafty, and he stumbles to remove his jacket and shirt. Nico stares at him the entire time, amused from the foot of the tub.

Jason does a double take, watching the pale lines of Nico’s chest and legs. Scars paint Nico’s body in faint strokes—over the forearms, across his chest, and a few over his shins. Never in his life did he imagine he’d be standing naked in front of Nico di Angelo—or have the opportunity to share a home and a life with this boy.

“What?” Nico asks, and the edge of his lip curls into a smile.

“You look nice,” Jason says, and he pushes hair out of his boyfriend’s eyes.

Again, Nico flashes the same look when Jason called him pretty. “Have you seen yourself?”

“Mm,” is all Jason can offer—and the buzz in his head blends with the shower steam. They hop into the shower together—and post-orgasmic kisses are just as good as any other. He thinks Nico’s smile looks a little brighter, and his gaze look a little more chipper.

He kisses Nico through soap suds, pushing wet hair out of Nico’s face, and just relishes in Nico’s soft touch against the corner of his lips.

“I love you,” Nico says.

“Me too,” Jason whispers back, and he kisses Nico again. “I love you too.”

Upon Nico’s suggestion, they strip the bed sheets soiled in liquids and sand. Jason feels as light as Nico looks, and they fall back into bed tangled in one another. He feels the same bliss as he would after a storm, or after a victory—and all of the elatedness of being able to come back from Elysium hand-in-hand with Nico blooms in full force.

For the second night in a row, Jason falls asleep next to the love of his life.

*

The following weeks pass fast. Percy gives Jason some sword-training classes to fill up his free time. Annabeth trades out some of the Ancient Greek classes for Latin. Jason buys a new sketchbook to figure out what new shrines and temples have yet to be erected, and Nico and he spend nights leaning into each other’s warmth and researching minor gods and goddesses. He gets to play Capture the Flag with Piper and Leo, and most of his greetings start with, “Hey—by the way, I’m alive again.”

When he’s not busy teaching Latin or sword-training, Piper, Leo and he hang out in Bunker Nine like old times. It’s strange hearing his best friends prepare for college—Jason is two years behind them since he was dead, but they’re happy together and promise to visit. Percy and he spar, but Annabeth calls it a dick-measuring contest.

(Jason knows he has the one-up because Percy can’t grow plants.)

Percy throws a hand on Jason’s chest and shouts _nope_ to every crisis that pops up, even if it’s something small as keeping five-year-old Tiana from Apollo Cabin from charming six-year-old Mack from Ares Cabin into spitting saucy limericks.

“You know how summer vacation is about relaxing?” Percy asks him. “You’re _relaxing._ ”

So, Jason’s not allowed to lift a sword for anything other than to teach class, and he notices all of his friends are extra conscientious of where he’s going. He admitted how strange it was to Leo once, and his best friend told him to deal with it.

He’s very aware that Nico is more attentive of him. Hazel reaffirmed that Nico had nightmares of Jason’s death, but he’s seen it— _felt_ it—full force, once, when Nico woke up in the middle of the night and shook him awake.

Nico flew through English and Italian and Bianca’s name came first—then Jason heard his own name spoken with the same anguish and misery. The rest of the night was spent coaxing Nico back to sleep. Jason didn’t close his eyes until he heard his boyfriend’s breath slow.

(Connor Stoll asked Jason the following afternoon how the nightmares were. Jason had to recollect his thoughts, remembering that the Stoll Brothers kept extra tabs on Nico— _especially_ after the son of Hades came back to camp the second time. After a vague confirmation, Connor convinced Chiron to relieve Nico of some shadowtraveling classes and Jason and Nico spent the afternoon wandering around New Rome and looking at all of the new additions to Temple Hill.)

And, Jason has his own nightmares, too. Bad dreams of Caligula’s face, of Medea cackling in his ears, and _seeing_ the spear pierce through him christen this new body. Nico catches Jason more than once just absentmindedly rubbing the nonexistent stab wounds, even if this body’s never been pierced before. He’s careful not to startle Jason by reaching out from behind. Jason doesn’t feel the raw emotions and frustrations of becoming a mania again—just a little bothered and uncomfortable if he’s contemplating for too long.

“What do you think happened to my old body?” Jason asks one evening at the brink of sleep.

Most nights, Nico likes to lay on Jason’s chest or cradle his arm to have his pulse nearby. It’s different from falling asleep in his old cot in Cabin One or his old dorm room. Back then he had the statue of his father glowering at him, or he was counting the days until Apollo’s arrival. His life felt more disposable. Now—with his friends constantly flanking to his side and being able to fall asleep with his boyfriend, Jason doesn’t think he could trade it for anything else.

Nico is quiet, tracing the veins in Jason’s forearm. “For all I know it’s still in New Rome. Hazel’s body was destroyed in Alaska when she brought down Alcyoneus the first time. The other spirits who came through the Doors of Death—their bodies rotted away centuries ago.”

“But there could be another me buried in New Rome,” Jason says. Admittedly, he hasn’t taken the time to visit his own grave. He’s heard the stories of his own funeral service and the tears shed. The Legion is growing again under Frank and Hazel’s care—and to all of the new campers, he’s even more of a myth than a person these days.

“Are you wanting to check?” For as numb as Nico is to summoning the dead and skeletal warriors, there’s a discomfort in his voice now.

“I,” Jason says softly, and he gestures to himself, “just want to know why _this_ is working now. You know?”

His arm still tingles with his twelve stripes from his time in the Legion. Jason’s found that Nico is much more of a tactile person than the son of Hades let on, thumbing the scar on his face before almost every kiss. Every other battle scar and wound, however, has ceased to exist.

He’s learned fun facts about himself: his body still very much responded to Nico and blowjobs were nice. They tried a few things over the course of a few weeks. Jason very much liked the grinding, the fondling, and the _stroking,_ and their latest escapade involved Nico dropping to his knees and some pleasant sucking. Every venture always ended with Jason holding Nico a little closer and Nico burying his face a little further into him.

No matter how excited he _is_ to explore this part of their relationship with Nico, there’s always a wave of relief that floods through Jason knowing that his body’s just _working._

And they’ve talked about it a few times. From the little things Jason understands about Nico’s relationship with Will, he knows his boyfriend hated the previous pace. Will outed Nico before he was comfortable, Will pushed Nico when he was reluctant, and Will was blunt. They’re on amicable terms _now_ and Jason thinks Nico appreciates the good moments—but Nico seems fine going at a speed that Jason’s ready for.

Nico hums against him. “Do you think things would be different if you were still with Piper?”

“No.” Jason doesn’t hesitate. “I don’t think anything would change. Nothing ever came from it—so to speak.” He flushes when he thinks he hears Nico snickering. “But I just—I don’t have that problem with you.”

Again, Nico grows quiet. “Have you ever considered anyone else?”

“There’s no one else to consider,” Jason responds almost immediately. He’s pondered this question before. Every person that was ever interested in him was interested in his father’s name first and Jason second. Even when he came to Camp Halfblood, his two best friends had preconceived notions of their friendship that made Jason wonder if he was supposed to act a certain way. “I mean—there were a few guys at Edgarton that liked _me_ , but it didn’t seem right to lead anyone since I knew I’d be dying soon. And—”

Jason hesitates, unsure of how to approach the subject again. Nico waits anyway, flopping onto his stomach so that they can make eye contact with each other.

“—and what happened with Piper was already humiliating enough,” Jason admits. “I didn’t need more confirmation about how much I suck at sex, you know?”

Nico’s expression twists—and before Jason can dwell too long, his boyfriend squeezes his hand again. “First of all, you’ve never sucked.”

“I know, but—”

“Second,” Nico continues, and a hand traces the lines up Jason’s abs and rests at his chest. Right on Jason’s heart. “I fell in love with _this._ We could _never_ have sex and I’d still be in love with you, Jason. _This_ is what impressed me. Not whether or not you can get one up.”

Jason looks up at his boyfriend. He thinks he’s gotten better at seeing in the dark since living in the Underworld. There was a time where Nico dismissed him and didn’t care to look him in the eye. Now, Nico stares up at him, expression stern with love.

“I told you,” Nico says, “you’re stuck with me.”

“But—what if it _stops_?”

Again—because he’s just the best boyfriend in the world—the corner of Nico’s lip curls. “Did I tell _you_ that I was in love with you, or your body?”

The same smile curls against Jason’s lips, and he feels as whole as he does every time he speaks to Nico. “Me.”

“Yeah. You.” Nico presses another kiss to Jason’s forehead, and then settles back to their first position.

Relief floods through Jason and he can’t help but sigh. He leans into Nico’s warmth, wrapping an arm around his boyfriend and holding him close. Nico melts into him easily—and it’s that feeling again, of feeling the son of Hades as an extension of himself.

“When do you want to take the next step?” Jason asks.

Nico hums sleepily, his hands just tracing the veins in Jason’s arms. “A wedding?”

Jason laughs at the shell of Nico’s ear. “I meant sex.”

Again, Nico goes quiet, but for an entirely different reason than Jason wondering if there was an extra Jason corpse in a coffin in New Rome. It’s a palpable silence Jason’s felt every time he comes back from his morning run, or Nico’s caught him at the end of swordtraining lessons. But it’s complimented with Nico’s usual thoughtfulness—something that Jason has greatly appreciated in having a partner that’s _done_ this before.

“Whenever you think you’re ready,” Nico says finally. Jason’s seen that face after post-orgasmic bliss. Nico’s smiles always look a bit wider and his shoulders seem more relaxed.

“Were you ready for your first time?”

“Yes and no,” Nico says after a brief lull. “Me not being ready was all mental. Will—he’s good at _caring_ , but it didn’t always come out right. He was always too forward and had his own ideas in how fast we should be going. You’ve met his dad.”

“Who’s a bit much,” Jason muses.

“A bit much,” Nico agrees, and he snorts. He grows quiet again to the point that Jason begins to worry.

“Did he make you do things you weren’t ready for?” Jason asks with concern.

“We always did things I wasn’t sure I was ready for,” Nico admits, and he says it so lightly that Jason bites back the urge to shake Will Solace down. After all, he _knows_ Will and Nico get along now. Will even seemed pleasantly surprised that Nico and Jason were together. “I always felt weird, even if I wanted it to happen. Will has a whole cabin full of siblings who support him. No one really _talked_ about sex back in the 1940s, let alone tell a ten-year-old kid.”

He laughs quietly, both fond and embarrassed. Out of reflex, Jason reaches out and pushes hair out of Nico’s face, and they lean into each other, cheek-to-cheek. He can actually feel Nico’s cheek ablaze, but also feels his boyfriend’s smile.

“My dad’s idea of showing his support was sending Plato’s spirit after me for a day and letting him describe gay sex back in Ancient Greece in excruciating detail,” Nico says. He shudders. “Believe me—there’s nothing more mortifying than an old ghost sitting on a rock and describing how he used to screw his apprentices.”

Even Jason has to laugh. “So what did you learn?”

Nico falls silent again, and Jason notices Nico seems to lean closer into him. “That when Zeus separated humans into two halves, it wasn’t always man and woman. It was man and man, woman and woman. Humans finding their other half in other humans, regardless of who they were.” 

He grows silent again, tracing Jason’s knuckles in the dark.

“That story used to be another reason why I thought I couldn’t fit in, aside from being Hades’ son,” Nico admits softly, and there’s a sadness and pensiveness in his tone that Jason hasn’t heard since they were back on the Argo II, when Nico had been heartwrenched and mentally exhausted by Cupid. He holds Nico a little tighter. “It made me think that liking boys was _wrong_ and just a phase, and eventually I was going to find a girl that I would _have_ to fall in love with. That story made me miserable.”

“Nico,” Jason urges softly, “nothing’s wrong with you. Everyone at camp _loves_ you.”

“I know that now,” Nico reassures, though Jason notices Nico’s hands lingering over his own. Then he snorts. “Apparently the creator of Mythomagic is this Christian man who wanted to teach watered down Greek mythology to his students. He thought it was safer to censor the _gay_ parts of Greek mythology than the parts where Kronos gruesomely ate his children.”

Jason makes a sound. “You learned Plato through _Mythomagic_?”

“The game has a good premise if you don’t think about it too much,” Nico says dismissively, and then Jason can practically _hear_ his boyfriend roll his eyes. “Ganymede isn’t mentioned _at all_. The story of Hyacinth only came out with the ninth edition and is _still_ a terrible interpretation. Then you have the people who cling to the first five editions and say nothing’s better than that.”

Jason can’t help but laugh at Nico’s rant.

However, Nico grows quiet again, his hand absentmindedly running through Jason’s hair. “Stuff like that—even back in Italy when I was little—was the reason why I thought liking boys was wrong. That just _kissing_ a boy was wrong, let alone wanting someone to touch me. Liking boys and being a son of Hades—that was my blood and sewage. Why people treated me poorly.” 

“Don’t say that about yourself,” Jason says immediately. He props up and frowns in concern at his boyfriend.

Fortunately, the edge of Nico’s lip curls—and even if the words alarm Jason, he realizes they’re behind Nico. Like Nico is reading a summary of a life long ago, and _he_ was the one who came back with a second chance to live.

“All I’m saying is, a lot of the reasons I wasn’t ready were because of what _other_ people told me what a relationship is supposed to look like,” Nico says. “My dad summoning Plato was the _strangest_ thing that he’s ever done to show that he supports me. Aside from a personal undead chauffeur. But it helped in a lot of ways.”

“But you weren’t nervous?”

“Will’s a doctor. Examining bodies is just what he wants to do for a living. He was very prepared.” There’s an evenness to Nico’s tone that Jason is grateful for. Jason can only assume the _other_ reasons were why Will and Nico eventually broke up. “I was nervous for other reasons.”

“But you liked it,” Jason says.

“I did,” Nico says, and the way he falls silent again makes Jason understand _why_ there was trepidation there. It isn’t frustration over Plato’s story, or Nico’s frustration with himself. “But…then the nightmares about your death started coming up, and you died, and…”

He trails off.

“It was pretty clear that I was never going to be the boyfriend that Will expected,” Nico says finally, “and I was never going to have the boyfriend that I wanted.”

Jason’s heart clenches in his chest, and he raises his head to look Nico in the eye. “I…is that really how you feel?”

Again, the edge of Nico’s lips curls into a smile, this time with a hint of amusement, He raises his own head and kisses Jason gently. Gently, he teases, “Do you think I want to grow old with just anyone?”

Jason knows he said those words in the heat of the moment ages ago but hearing them uttered back to him even months after coming back to life just makes his heart soar. Nico yanks him down.

“Stop floating off the bed.”

“Sorry,” Jason apologizes. “Plato—the original Plato—was right, though. You don’t have to be a man and a woman to be in a relationship.”

“And a relationship doesn’t need to have sex to love someone,” Nico says.

“Right, and a relationship doesn’t need sex to—oh.” Jason blinks. He looks back down to Nico and is met with a smile.

“You accept me for all of me, ghosts and all,” Nico whispers, “so why would I accept any less of you?”

Gods. “I love you.”

“I know,” Nico says back, and he pushes the hair out of Jason’s face. “I love you too.”

“I know,” Jason replies, and he doesn’t think those two words encapsulate just _how much_ he can feel in the strength of Nico’s feelings. There’s no fear of disappointment or headache that came to dating Piper—or that came with any person that was interested in him, really.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Nico echoes from earlier. His demeanor morphs, his eyes diverting for just a moment in nervousness. “I’m don’t…I’m not sure if I’m the _best_ person to be doing this with, but I want to make this enjoyable for you. Especially after Piper.”

Jason stares in surprise. “Nico, I only want to have sex _because_ it’s with you.”

“I—” Nico hesitates. “I want it to be perfect for you.”

“Perfect’s overrated. You said so.” Jason smiles, tracing the lines of Nico’s jaw in the dark in the same pattern he’s done since getting together. He’s memorized every line and curve of Nico’s face easily. “I just want you.” 

“Good,” Nico says, and Jason can actually hear the relief in his voice.

“It’s all good,” Jason reassures. “For me at least. If it’s not for you—”

“It’s all good,” Nico echoes, and Jason tries his hardest not to float off the bed again. He focuses on the way Nico smiles, and the way Nico hasn’t let go of him since yanking him down the first time. Nico has held his heart since leaving Elysium—and long before that, too.

*

They visit the Underworld again when the leaves begin to change. When the green drains from the trees, and the flowers take longer to bloom. Summoning flowers wears Jason down more with Persephone making her transition back to the land of the dead.

Hades _and_ Persephone are waiting for them at DOA Records when Jason suggests taking the scenic route. Jason’s seen spirits physically zip their mouths shut when they’ve irritated Nico far too much—and he’s witnessed being entranced by Nico’s voice when he was still a ghost.

Seeing wandering spirits at the record studio gawk and stare in awe at their new King is a different experience entirely. After such a failed meeting with his own father, Jason was reluctant to speak out of turn with the King of the Underworld—but Hades welcomed his opinions. For all that Jason’s been through, he’s less nervous about standing before his uncle than he is his father.

Charon is pleasantly surprised to see them. They’re put on a much bigger boat than before, watching the ethereal glow of the River Styx as paper boats sail against them and tread the fine line between life and death. The first time Jason ever met the Queen of the Underworld, Persephone had barged into the throne room and showered her husband in kisses. Hades’s reaction was much quainter, much tamer, like the pristine edges of their palace.

Seeing them now, after several spectacular months with his own boyfriend, Jason understands the subtleties better: how King Hades tilts his head when he smiles, or how he runs his hand down Queen Persephone’s forearm before lacing hands, just to feel a little more of his beloved goddess. Persephone has a sharp gaze that has always made Jason jump—even now, when he’s alive—and she seems to be more analytical when Hades isn’t looking. Jason supposes she has to be—considering she surprised everyone by eating pomegranate seeds.

Jason gets to watch Persephone and Nico lean over and grab paper boats at different times during their trip. Hades compliments him more than once before they make it to the other end of the Underworld, and the red burning in Jason’s cheeks is a reminder that he’s very much alive.

“These trinkets are darling,” Persephone says during the trip, and she takes out a miniature sculpture of Charon.

Nico unfolds his own paper boat and offers Jason some Teddy Grahams.

“Yes, my queen,” Charon agrees. He waits a beat, then adds, “I’m quite popular these days. I’ve officiated a wedding—”

Nico snorts and shoves a Teddy Graham in Jason’s mouth, but the amusement is there.

“—and I’m much more recognizable to the spirits,” Charon says. “ _The paper boat man_ , they say. Perhaps we can reconsider my compensation package.”

Hades rubs his chin, looking contemplative, but Persephone waves a hand dismissively.

“Your compensation would be going to all of these trinkets anyway,” she says. “Consider it cutting out the middleman.”

(Jason decides not to mention how Hades instructed Alecto to spare no expense when it came to building Underworld shrines and temples.)

Charon lets out a defeated sigh and docks them at the other end of the river. By the end of their trip, Persephone has at least three more sail boats, relishing in how charming they are.

“I quite miss you, Jason Grace,” Charon tells him fondly. “I can’t wait until you die.”

“Me neither,” Hades mutters, while Persephone wholeheartedly nods as she plucks a fourth boat out of the river with a despondent sigh. Jason doesn’t miss the way Nico’s eyes flicker with amusement—he just makes a mental note to see if the people of Elysium will offer more coinage and less snacks. And to buy Teddy Grahams for their cabin.

Eventually they return to the palace. Persephone holds off on reprimanding Jason about practicing his plant magic until they make it to the garden. Given all of the other things that preoccupy Jason on the surface world, he tries his best not to summarize by saying he has a _life_ now, literally. After all, it’s not like they _don’t_ appear. The flowers still appear when Jason gets too excited or if he concentrates hard enough. Cabin Thirteen has its own vines that have cropped up every once in a while, that gives the obsidian walls a more Underworldly quality.

Unfortunately, those explanations aren’t enough for his sister. Persephone’s presence alone makes her garden stretch and glow with vibrant hues, like waking up after a long rest. Spring coming back to the Underworld is very much like spring on the surface world, if not filled with more love and more sweetness.

Persephone still demands that he makes the flowers flourish, make the petals softer, and make the branches stretch further to create richer shadows in the fields. Jason even summons storm clouds for a field of flowers. There’s a comfort there, after months under her tutelage.

She hums when she’s finally satisfied with his work and watches as Jason waves the storm away. “Father asked about you.”

Jason pauses. “He did?”

Like most of their sessions, Persephone is inspecting each and every flower to see if they’ve blossomed to perfection. There’s a wry amusement there as she plucks a rose and holds it against her red lips. “He was wondering why you haven’t gone to visit him yet.”

“In _Olympus_?”

“In general,” Persephone corrects, and she snorts. “He mentioned that you haven’t once asked for his guidance in that silly cabin at Halfblood or asked how his day has been in New Rome. I do believe he mentioned there was a time near that crude pile of rocks, and you were being fing—”

“Oh,” Jason interrupts immediately, his face flourishing as red as the rose in his sister’s hand. Another bush frantically appears to the left of the Queen, and she redirects her attention there, inspecting Jason’s premature petals. “I’m, um, not staying at my father’s cabin.”

Persephone perks her head back, holding back a critique. “Since when?”

“Since coming back to life,” Jason admits, and she looks even more intrigued. Jason inspects a pomegranate tree and makes a personal note to grow some more for Nico before they leave.

Persephone accentuates the work on Jason’s rose bush, smoothing out awkward roses. “Go on.”

“I’ve,” Jason confesses slowly, “never felt comfortable sleeping in Cabin One. It’s always felt like a glorified temple like the one back at Camp Jupiter. After two wars and twelve years in the Legion, I’ve only met Dad once and I ruined it. All it took was a request from Elysium and Hades was willing to see me. Then he wanted to see me more.”

The edge of her lip curls into a smile, and Jason can’t help but think it’s reminiscent to what he’s seen on Nico’s. There’s a fondness there, even with Hades on the other side of the palace. Jason witnessed it many times during the months that the King and Queen of the Underworld were together.

“He’s quite the god,” she says finally, and she thumbs the thornless stem of the roses. “So serious, yet quite the soft heart.”

“Yeah,” Jason agrees. He picks up some flowers at his feet and rubs his arm. “I…when I made it rain here a couple of months ago, I was happy that I had a second chance to make my father proud. But—these last couple of months, I haven’t thought about Dad once. And—I’m happy.”

He's happy being able to wake up next to the love of his life every morning, and overjoyed being able to see his friends over the weekend with just shadowtraveling. Training kids at Camp Halfblood in swordtraining doesn’t equate to leading an entire army. Chiron asked if Jason wants to try school again—but given he _died_ the last time he agreed, the centaur didn’t push.

Jason tried Nico’s method of listening to the dead scholars that wrote their textbooks. Nico has a very clear direction he wants to go in his studies—of being able to guide and talk to young, traumatized demigods who make it past the borders of Halfblood Hill.

It’s a sensible route for Nico. Percy explained once that Nico was a chatterbox before Bianca died, and Jason saw it firsthand in the memories back in Split. The smiles on Nico’s face have a different light to them and glow with a different intensity than that ten-year-old boy. Each one is earned after such a difficult time grieving—and Nico doesn’t want anyone else to ever experience that.

On the other hand, Jason’s time in the Legion continued longer than the required ten years, and before he could consider stepping down and focusing on his own life, Juno swapped Percy and him. Having the amnesia was the first time he had to discover _himself_ aside from being a son of Zeus rather than a son of Jupiter, but even that was constrained with preparing for war and living up to Piper’s expectations of their relationship.

_Most_ of his temples have already been erected, and Nico and he plan on spending the winter travelling around and communing with old scholars again for the best way to represent other minor deities. Winter will have people that can take over some of the camp classes while they’re gone. Jason’s not sure _what_ he wants to do once those temples are finished.

But he knows he’s closer, not worrying about the expectations of being a son of Jupiter or tying himself to prophecies. Not hearing from _any_ deities as of late is a godsend of its own—including his dad, who Hades insists is the reason for most of their wars. For a son of storms and wind, Jason’s finally able to breathe. He’s finally _letting_ himself breathe, and all of his friends comment on it.

“Good,” Persephone says, and it’s laced with the same enthusiasm and approval like the first time Jason was able to make a leaf move. She hums. “Being tied to our father’s name is a curse more than a blessing.”

“There’s a lot of pressure,” Jason agrees, recalling the words that Hercules uttered to him years ago. The ones Piper regrets never discussing when they were dating, and the ones that Nico counteracts by telling Jason he’s more than his father’s name.

“Thankfully you and our sister are so similar, given the both of you are the result of his latest conquest. Latest known, at least,” Persephone says. Before death, Jason would’ve grimaced at his conception being reduced to nothing but a _conquest._ Now, seeing his goddess sister speak about the King of the Gods with such a derisive tone just makes him laugh.

“You think Thalia and I are alike?” he asks, and Jason can’t help but feel elated at the compliment.

“You’ve certainly taken the least annoying aspects about Father and improved his worst qualities,” Persephone says. She rolls her eyes upwards, as though rolling her eyes at the sky, and looks back to Jason. “I’m sure you’ve heard my beloved criticizing him for causing more wars, directly or indirectly. _All_ of us could tell already. Little Thalia was going to be a natural born leader. She was willing to lay her life down for that Hermes boy and Athena girl, much like you did for Piper McLean. The two of you certainly _love_ the same.”

“She’s going to be coming up to Camp Halfblood when we get back,” Jason says, and he can’t contain his excitement. “No huntress duties. Artemis is letting Reyna and her take a minivacation to see Nico and me.”

Persephone hums with amusement, and inaudibly gestures to an array of white lilies for Jason to fix. “Good.”

“Do you…do you think I should reach out to Dad?”

“Would that make you happy?”

Jason hesitates. Even as the words came out of his mouth, he couldn’t help but feel that they were laced with a sense of dread.

Persephone evidently catches onto it. She hums once more, sidling into Jason’s personal space to inspect the lilies, then gestures for Jason to fix them. “Sister Artemis has her huntresses. Brother Apollo has his sun chariot. Father’s court is filled with his own children, who’ve shaped the living plane. But—”

She turns in his direction, expression sharp.

“—no matter what we’ve done for our names and, by extension, further his name, he only notices when he’s displeased. Look at our brother, Dionysus. He was part of father’s court after being a demigod for a sum number of years, and after fucking the wrong nymph, Father condemned him to a century of punishment at that little camp of yours,” she says. She rolls her eyes in a disdainful manner once more. “That frat boy, Heracles—he’s considered Father’s greatest demigod son of all time and he’s utterly miserable. Believe me when I say I’m happy to escape the drama of being related to Father for half of the year.”

A quiet, awkward chuckle falls from Jason’s lip.

“I’m sure there will be _many_ chances to continue proving your worth to our father, if that’s truly what you want,” Persephone says. She reaches over and places a lily behind Jason’s ear before he can protest. “But I personally like the alternative, where you continue to _ignore_ him and live a more prosperous life, like myself.”

Jason fiddles with the stem of the rose with amusement. “What if he gets angry if I ignore him?”

“Then perhaps he’ll stupidly punish you with death, and we can start having family dinners again,” Persephone retorts, and he laughs. “Now—help me with the rest of this garden, or I _will_ make sure you never leave.”

*

“I’ve had Alecto prepare the rooms for you,” Hades tells them, when he arrives to the gardens to swap out his son for his wife.

“Oh,” Jason says, and he can’t help but turn red again, while Nico looks amused. “I think we’re just going to—”

“One room will suffice, Dad,” Nico reassures, and he greets Jason with a kiss on the cheek while Jason is still fumbling through his words.

“Nevertheless,” Hades says dismissively, and he exchanges a very wry look with Persephone that makes Jason worry, “it’s prepared. And I can send Plato—”

“ _Dad_ ,” Nico interjects, and he blanches in horror.

“Very well,” Hades mutters, and Persephone pats him sympathetically on the shoulder before they shadowtravel—rather than walk—back into the palace. Jason decides he doesn’t want to know where the other end of the shadows spill out.

Nico and he walk over to the swinging bench, where they’d reconnected for the first time since Jason’s death. There’s a lightheartedness to the atmosphere—of just being able to focus on Nico and nothing else. Jason thinks they should go on vacations more often.

“You and your dad were gone for a while,” Jason notes, and he rocks on his heels at the foot of the bench, his hand intertwined with Nico’s. He summons an iris at his feet—one of the many hundreds that Persephone made him correct.

Nico takes the flower like he has the other several dozen that Jason has summoned in the surface world, shrugging. It’s almost instinctive now. “We talked about things. How my studies are going. How you and I are going. What the newest hair trends are.”

“Hair trends?” Jason muses, and he tries to think about the regal King of the Underworld and Riches with a manbun and skinny jeans.

“Dad likes to talk. Sometimes about important things, other times about nothing in particular, just to keep the conversation going. I think it keeps the wailing spirits in his robes at bay,” Nico explains with amusement. “They deter him from important topics a lot.”

“Like how I was living in the palace for over a year?”

“Exactly,” Nico grumbles, and his expression suddenly twists reminiscently to Persephone.

Jason laughs. “But we’re together now.”

“We’re together now,” Nico echoes. He leans into Jason’s warmth, then raises his head to press a kiss to Jason’s mouth.

Jason hums, raising his hand to Nico’s shoulder, and happily kisses back. All he can think about is the first reunion—how warm and alive Nico felt beneath his palm when he reached out to embrace him—and how his chest swelled after ages of feeling empty in Elysium. Holding Nico back then was the closest Jason could get to holding his own heart, and it only got better every time Nico came to visit.

Nothing has made him happier than being alive again and being with his friends. Being with Nico and making a garden flourish with as much love as Queen Persephone loves King Hades, causing flowers to bloom at the pulse of his heart and summoning a storm that used to define his very essence.

The swinging bench stalls beneath them. Nico’s hands climb the length of Jason’s arms before wrapping behind Jason’s shoulder blades, and Jason happily surfs Nico’s legs with his own palm. As Jason leans in, the bench rocks with them, and he grazes Nico’s mouth against his own. There’s warmth there, intermixed between the two of them.

Nico parts to breathe, plum red glowing in his cheeks and lips wet, like dewy grass. His laughter is sweet and vibrant, like honeysuckles, and while Jason isn’t musically gifted, he suddenly wants to string together a symphony full of Nico’s sounds. The corner of Nico’s lips rises, and Jason can see a reflection of his own delight and own happiness in those eyes. Being able to _see_ Nico and _feel_ Nico makes him happy and being able to _hold_ Nico makes his heart full.

“I love you,” Jason whispers, and savors in the glow of Nico’s eyes. “I want to show you how much I love you.”

The other edge of Nico’s lips, and he’s humming as he traces the inside of Jason’s thigh and sniffs the ivory flower. “You’ve shown me plenty.”

“I want to show you more.”

“What’d you have in mind?”

“You and me,” Jason explains, and he shudders as Nico teases the button of his jeans.

“You and me and more,” Nico repeats, his eyebrows furrowing together. Then his eyes widen, his hand stalling over the tent of Jason’s pants. “Oh.”

“You,” Jason says, swallowing hard, “in me.”

“Oh,” Nico says again, and Jason doesn’t miss the way Nico suddenly gulps or how Nico suddenly chews on that shiny bottom lip, as charcoal eyes fall.

“Um,” Jason replies, suddenly feeling less bold than before—though shockingly not any less charged. “If that’s okay—”

“Yeah,” Nico breathes, and he climbs up to his knees to kiss Jason again. It’s deep and thorough and succulent, and, Jason thinks he wouldn’t mind just bending over in the garden right now, if it’s Nico. They’re practically there already, Jason’s hands reaching to squeeze Nico’s ass as his boyfriend clamors on top of him.

“So,” Jason mumbles when they each other enough room to breathe, “your bedroom or mine?”

*

They’ve talked about it plenty. Jason thinks part of the reason Piper and he worked so poorly was because they were relying on each other—Piper, as a daughter of the Goddess of Love, and Jason, as a son of Jupiter—who Persephone would also readily dub God of Putting His Dick Anywhere—and communicated awfully. But even before they started touching each other below the belt, Nico insisted that they talk to each other.

At some point, they talked about what would happen at that next step. Jason asked a lot of questions—he’s in a constant state of wanting to please Nico and wanting to hear every sound elicited from the back of Nico’s throat. He wanted to treat sex like he treated other things—knowing both sides and understanding the sums of a whole. Two sides, like Greek and Roman. Like tradition and revolution. Like the sky and the earth—and two bodies joining together like halves of one heart.

Treating it pragmatically made him feel more comfortable—which he never quite felt since that first time, when his dick refused to work, no matter how beautiful Piper was, and no matter how she tried to guide him, and no matter how he tried to convince himself he wanted it.

The idea of fucking Nico almost feels like a redemption for all of the times that he couldn’t get that far with Piper—proof that finally, Jason could get his body to work and impress someone like the son of Jupiter that he was and the boyfriend Piper expected him to be.

Except, Piper told him months ago that she shouldn’t be part of the equation of Jason getting an erection anymore, and Persephone pointed out that Jason was far happier ignoring their father than trying to impress him.

And _neither_ Piper _nor_ Dad are on his mind with Nico on top of him, lips hot against Jason’s own. Nico’s been a guiding force for his heart _and_ for the throbbing below Jason’s belt, and it’s not about redemption for being a failure of a son and boyfriend. He wants Nico to guide him through this, like he was guided out of the Underworld.

Each touch is a little more familiar every time they do this—the way Jason’s fingers trace the divots of Nico’s body, the way Nico’s hands palms the lines of Jason’s abs, and how each kiss feels more heated and fervent than the last. There’s a place right behind Nico’s ear, where Jason brushes with his thumbnail that makes Nico tremble and stutter a breath each time. Nico knows that if he drags his hands across Jason’s hipbone at the right time, Jason sees colors.

The satin sheets are as red as rubies. Jason’s bare legs glide against the mattress with ease, and the sound of Nico’s hands run over the sheets is as pleasant as the breathy moans in Jason’s ears. Against the red sheets, Nico is pale and beautiful, and Jason wants to kiss every bit of bare skin.

He knows Nico has the same idea, going from pressing his lips to the crook of Jason’s neck and suckling, to scraping his hands down Jason’s biceps. There’s the slightest sting—one that reminds that they’re together and alive and _together._

When Nico rolls his hips, Jason sighs, his cock just _aching_ to be touched.

There’s no nervousness there. He’s not in his head, worried about failing. _He_ wants Nico, and his heart wants Nico, and gods, _all_ of him wants Nico.

At some point, Nico pulls away, the red glowing down his cheeks past his collarbone. He reaches over to the nightstand and pulls out a bottle of lube and condoms.

“You just have that down here?” Jason asks and blinks in surprise.

Nico looks back at him, amused. “What do you think my dad meant when he said he made preparations?”

Gods, that’s not a conversation Jason thinks he wants to have. “Like, new bed sheets.”

“They’re always new,” Nico explains, and Jason suddenly wonders if he ever saw the laundry room when he lived in the palace. Nico reaches over, curling the pads of his fingers in the hem of Jason’s boxers, and kisses down his abs. There’s a pause—where Nico licks the precum at the head of Jason’s cock—then bobs.

“ _Oh_ —” Jason’s body rocks, and his hands fly to cradle Nico’s head between his hands. He swallows hard—and so does Nico, firmly, and Jason’s toes curl as Nico engulfs him. “D…does that mean…you and Will…? Down here?” 

Nico cocks his head, eyes piquing at Jason curiously. There’s no jealousy there, Jason just has a hard time imagining Will Solace pulling away from the med bay. Nico bobs his head once more, and Jason sighs happily. With a pleasant suck, Nico reels back.

“No,” Nico says simply, and he climbs up the length of Jason’s body for a kiss. His lips are softer, after clasping around Jason’s cock, and there’s the faintest (weird) taste of Jason’s own precum in the kiss, but Jason welcomes every touch from his boyfriend. Nico peels back, his lips swollen, and a smile curls against his mouth. “He thought this part of me—” He gestures vaguely at what Jason assumes means the Underworld. “—was too creepy.”

“But I like this part of you,” Jason protests. “I love all parts of you.”

“You have weird taste,” Nico muses—though he smiles. Then, he uncaps the lube and dribbles it in his hand. He presses a kiss to Jason’s cheek. “Ready for your favorite part?”

If someone told Jason a long time ago that getting touched on the prostate was _amazing_ , he would’ve stopped trying to make compromises with his dick. Nico had played with it once, when Jason was still recovering from the discovery of blowjobs—and just as Jason thought he could stay after another toe-curling orgasm, Nico had decided to take that as a challenge.

(And—if oral felt as good for Piper as Nico’s mouth felt over Jason’s dick, it suddenly made a lot more sense why she wanted to reciprocate.)

He doesn’t even realize he’s staring until Nico is leaning in for a kiss again. Nico’s hands are long and slender, and the joints in his fingers are prominent. Jason probably stares at them too much.

“You’re staring,” Nico muses, and it’s the way he says it just makes Jason lick his lips.

“There’s a lot to look at,” Jason protests.

The other end of Nico’s lips coil, and—gods _,_ if Jason drew his last breath here, he thinks he’d be okay. Nico wets his fingers, and Jason readies himself, his hand already flying to stroke himself. He moans softly, feeling a digit protrude his hole—the light sting, like Nico’s hands digging crescents in his skin. Nico never starts with one anymore—it’s always two, first, because Jason likes the little discomfort that comes with it—the way Nico arches his fingers, and bends them into a hook—the way Nico just focuses on him intensely each time he moves.

“ _Fuck_ ,” Jason whispers, when Nico finds it, and he always finds himself moaning a little differently. A little deeper. Hotter. He hangs onto Nico’s own reaction—how Nico’s gaze seems to burn hotter than his own body the moment the edge of Nico’s finger brushes up against his prostate. “Why are you so good at this?”

“You’re easy to read,” Nico mumbles, and his fingers curl once more. Jason moans again, and those colors appear—just abstract and indescribable—maybe a rainbow. That expression shifts on Nico’s face again—a little nervous, a little concerned—and amused. “And between Piper and I, I have a little more experience in this area.”

“You do,” Jason agrees, “with my heart.”

Nico’s smile fades momentarily and he peers back contemplatively, his hand still buried inside Jason. Of all times to be lost in thought, now probably isn’t the best time, but Jason knows he’s proven to be more mindful than anyone asked for in the bedroom. And Nico asks a question that Jason’s never really provided the answer to. “How am I different?”

“You just are,” Jason says—he’s not even sure how to put it into words. “Because—it’s you.”

“But Piper’s _Piper_ ,” Nico protests, and he looks even more confounded.

Jason knows, because he’s also confused. “Yeah, and you’re you.”

Nico makes a face. The occasional mention of exes has never quite sparked jealousy—and still doesn’t. The unsureness is so quick that it’s almost flippant. Jason jumps because Nico goes back to twisting his fingers, and it’s a reminder that he’s very much still inside Jason.

“Piper’s pretty,” Nico starts, and he drags his fingers inside of Jason so pleasantly that Jason moans and thinks all of the words in his brain have wandered afar. “There’s history there between the two of you—and there’s history there between the two of us, too, but—”

He stalls, and he looks like he has as much difficulty explaining to Jason how he doesn’t understand why it isn’t Piper as much as Jason struggles to explain why he knows it’s just Nico.

“She’s pretty,” Nico finishes. “And I’m me.”

“You’re you,” Jason agrees, and his voice tightens.

Nico peers back up, and Jason is mindful to stall Nico’s hand in his ass, lest he wanted to blow things up here—literally. Nico seems to be fiddling with Jason’s prostate as much as he fiddled with the skull ring sitting in a fancy ceramic dish on the nightstand—and it does wonders to short circuit Jason’s brain.

“You’re the only person who just _scoffed_ at who my dad was,” Jason says. “I mean—the only other person who did that was Percy—and maybe Annabeth, but they’re basically joined at the hip. And then there’s Persephone—”

“Please don’t mention my stepmother while my hand’s inside of you.”

“You started it, with your dad,” Jason protests. “Everyone at Camp Jupiter treated me like some prince in waiting. I mean—Camp Halfblood was a little better, but everyone knew I was placed there for a quest. Leo, Piper, and I forged a new friendship in place of the fake one, but there’s no telling whether they would’ve even tried to befriend me without Juno.”

“Please,” Nico mutters, though his resolve wavers. “You make friends like pollen makes flowers.”

“I make those, too,” Jason replies, and he smiles when Nico’s lips twitch. “And I make friends _now._ You and I didn’t _have_ a relationship before Juno intervened. It means you and I started with a clean slate. And—we filled every bit of it. So much, in fact, that I kept having to buy a new sketchbook.”

Once more, Nico’s demeanor slips contemplatively, as he gazes towards Jason.

“I,” Jason starts, and he thinks back to his quiet little dorm back in Pasadena, a lifetime ago, “used to write in those sketchbooks. About how much I—”

“I know,” Nico says, and he traces the inside of Jason’s thigh carefully. The touch is cold, but gentle, like little flakes of snow. “I read every word.”

“Oh,” is all Jason says, and his cheeks bloom red. For some reason, as he is, knowing that Nico read the words in his sketchbook makes him feel more exposed than his own naked body did. Writing each word and etching each sketch was filling out a memoir he never intended to publish. “I mean—I meant all of it.”

“Let’s work on saying them instead of hiding them away until after death,” Nico points out, and his gaze narrows with teasing exasperation.

“I could sit here all day and talk about how much I love you,” Jason offers, and Nico’s smiling now, both sides of his lips lifting. “You’re different for me, Nico.”

Nico shifts contemplatively.

“You have my heart,” Jason repeats, and he moves his hands over his pec, to the center of his chest. “It never stopped beating for you, even in death.”

“That’s not—”

“It was already beating for you again the moment you came into the throne room,” Jason interjects, and he watches as Nico’s expression soften. “Now—”

He kisses his boyfriend—fervent and sweet in a way he didn’t know those two words could go together—and reaches for the displaced condom at the edge of the dead. For such a sudden shift in conversation, they’re back on the original path that they set out for. There’s a gentleness there, that works in harmony with the ardor and excitement of their kiss. When they part, Jason watches Nico’s eyes travel as Jason rips apart the condom package.

“Please take the rest of me,” Jason whispers. “Because I’m yours.”

Nico makes a soft sound—just a sweet chuckle, followed by a quiet moan as Jason rolls the condom over his cock. Then, Jason inches backwards into the pillows again and watches as Nico lathers up his erection.

The tip of Nico’s cock is eons past two or three fingers. There’s that burn again, when Nico enters him.

“ _Oh_ …” Jason shudders—it already _feels_ nice, sheathing Nico like he would his own sword, and Jason’s moan is so low that he thinks he hears Nico’s breath hitch.

He sees Nico’s entire body seems to rumble as the other demigod moans. Nico tilts his head to the side, to capture a better image of Jason below. The red is painted across his face, flowing down the rest of his faint olive skin, and Jason is so excited that he just wants to usher Nico deeper into him.

It's achingly slow at first—Nico insists on moving at a snail’s pace as he rocks his hips—but then he makes to the end of Jason, and Jason jumps again—feeling something much bigger than Nico’s lithe fingers brushing up against him.

“Uh,” Jason breathes, his own mind dull as he tries to stare above him. “Um, how’s that feel?”

“Amazing,” Nico says airily, and— _gods_ —he rolls his hips again, this time bucking a little harder, and Jason’s hands fly to the satin sheets around him. When they moan, they moan together, Nico’s breathy noises filling in the gaps in Jason’s own lulls, when Nico just slams into him.

_“Oh_ ,” Jason mutters—lower and hotter, and _burning_ , as Nico presses him with a feat of strength that still surprises Jason, after so many months of dating.

Nico leans in with his own body, which somehow magically changes the angle of his pivots, and Jason makes a higher sound, as a sweat-matted forehead brushes up against his own. Jason lifts his head for a kiss, which is almost a challenge with Nico in him, moving him.

Sex to Jason has always just been a ridiculous beast—one of those humiliating monsters that he couldn’t just slay with a sword—but it’s more of an artform now, with Nico sheathing himself in the length of Jason’s body—he sees so many stars and colors, and notices each stroke and line in Nico’s face as Nico stares down at him with eagerness.

Jason’s aware of the heaviness of Nico’s breath, of the way Nico’s hands are able to graze gently and grip harshly, to the point where Jason is excitedly on his toes—to see how Nico’s face changes, to see how the color paints across his bare chest, to _feel_ Nico in him as much as feeling Nico on him—with heavy lips and delicate kisses.

He's throbbing, too, agonizingly so, each time Nico thrusts into him. A bolt of pleasure just shoots through Jason each time Nico makes contact.

“ _Gods_ , Nico,” Jason gasps. “I’m—”

“Yeah,” Nico breathes, and Jason desperately wants to kiss that pretty mouth again.

Jason almost comes right there, the moment Nico’s hand flies to his throbbing cock. There’s one hand digging nails in his thigh, but the other grips him intensely, dragging a finger over the precum that’s just oozing out of the tip of his cock, and Jason opens his mouth for a moan, but his brain melts with pleasure before he can expel a sound.

It's intense. Jason reaches up mid-thrust to pull Nico into a bruising kiss. He wants to _feel_ Nico in every sense of the word—mind, body, and soul—and Jason thinks they’ve covered all of those bases now, considering he died and the boy who brought him back to life is holding him close.

Nico jolts suddenly, and Jason smiles sheepishly.

“Sorry,” he says, and he waves away the tiny sparks in his hands.

Luckily for Jason, Nico isn’t deterred. And he’s used to it by now.

Instead, Nico smirks—devilish and boyish in a way that others didn’t get to see behind the four walls of Cabin Thirteen.

“For the love of Persephone and Hades, Jason Grace,” Nico teases, and he coils his hand more tightly around Jason’s erection, using the other to cup Jason’s face, “are you trying to electrocute my dick off?”

“Um, no,” Jason says, and he moans as Nico strokes him, fingers pressing to the narrow line below the tip of his cock gently before Nico gives him a tug. He laughs breathily—and moans, too, because no way in Hades has Nico stopped thrusting. “I’m quite a fan of it right now.”

Nico laughs, too, sweet and succulent like in the garden.

“You get to mention your parents,” Jason jokes, and he moans again as Nico palms the tip of his cock, “but I don’t?”

“They’re mine,” Nico protests, but it’s in good humor. But then his tone shifts, and he stops mid-thrust once more to lean into Jason. He presses a kiss to Jason’s forehead, his charcoal eyes as dark as the Underworld, and as inviting in a way that Cabin One never has been. They’re soft, like the day Nico took his hand and they danced in the rain, and Jason just feels _whole._

He loves stepping in puddles with Nico, as much as he loves kissing Nico. He loves all the ways he can spill his heart out for Nico—through the pages of a book, through word of mouth, through a kiss, through a _stroke—_ and loves that it can be as funny as it can be intense between the two of them. _Just_ them—in the four walls of their cabin, of this bedroom—and no one else.

“Gods,” Jason rasps, “Oh—gods, Nico—I—”

“I know,” Nico says with a heated moan, and he pivots his hips once more, one hand clutched tightly around the frame of Jason’s face. “I love you too.”

“Oh—” With one more swift tug, Jason comes.

His entire body trembles, like the prickling of thunder as it reverberates off of him, and the pleasure surges through Jason in a lightning storm. He’s gasping for air like he’s never breathed before, each inhale burning in the back of his throat, seeking air like a shadow to a flame.

Nico isn’t too far after him. There’s a pulse to Nico’s cock in Jason, which just makes him shudder. He basks in the blurry after sight of Nico coming down from the high of his own ecstasy, chest rising and falling slowly.

A heartbeat passes, as Jason tries to recover his senses. He tries not to look disappointed when Nico pulls out of him. Like always, Nico has the common sense between the two of them to clean up—specifically by going into the bathroom to dispose of the used condom.

He's tender, too, using the same hand that was once scraping at Jason’s thigh to graze over his stomach instead, as he wipes away the semen. A look of tender worry flashes over his eyes. “How was that?”

“Better,” is all Jason can say, which evokes amusement from his beloved boyfriend.

“Better than what?” Nico asks.

“Than perfect,” Jason mumbles, and this time Nico laughs. Jason wobbles as he sits up—and almost misses when he reaches out to kiss Nico. “Shower time?”

He’s not sure if the words actually come out correctly, but Nico grins all the same. Nico holds him steady before pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Shower time.”

*

“This is my favorite part,” Jason tells Nico.

Nico caresses his back gently, tracing the curve of Jason’s spine with a delicate touch. Jason’s thoroughly latched to his boyfriend, face buried in Nico’s stomach. He doesn’t necessarily hurt—it’s a nice ache. The heat of the shower made him feel even hazier—to the point that Nico laughed and shampooed his hair when Jason forgot to blink for far too long. Jason likes hearing Nico’s laugh. He likes making Nico smile a little wider and _feeling_ every bit of Nico.

“Cuddling?” Nico muses, though he doesn’t stop rubbing Jason’s spine. It’s a quiet inspection to make sure Jason’s okay—and for all of the verbose statements Jason knows that he’s prone to for Nico di Angelo, he loves how Nico reciprocates—just softly thumbing Jason’s wrist before holding his hand, or feeding him without even looking to see if Jason’s opened his mouth. Or now, taking in all of the ways Jason may react from still being tender.

“I never want to let go,” Jason whispers, close and dear to the SPQR logo at Nico’s chest.

Nico’s hand stops abruptly at Jason’s bare flesh, instead coursing through blond hair instead. He lowers his gaze, long eyelashes fluttering as he stares down at Jason, and smiles. “You never have to.”

“Was it good for you?” Jason asks sleepily. He thinks he’s found a different way to bury his face into Nico’s torso—a better way, of pressing his cheek to Nico’s ribcage. There’s a calculative pause once more.

“It,” Nico says after quiet speculation, “was emotional.”

“Yeah?” Jason asks. “Like in an, _I want to cry_ sort of way?”

Nico snorts, his eyebrows furrowing together sheepishly. There’s a bliss to post-orgasmic Nico, just lax and pleasant that makes Jason even happier. “Maybe, if you insisted on waxing poetics at me.”

“Please don’t,” Jason laughs, ‘I’ve done enough crying for the both of us.”

“So have I,” Nico mutters—and Jason thinks this might be the first time they’ve talked about his death without getting too worked up. It only makes him hold Nico closer, his legs curling to press against Nico’s arched back.

He thinks back to the limbo between his old life and new, where Nico made visits to the palace. Where Jason wished each hug lasted a little longer, and where he wished he was brave enough to ask Nico to stay with him but knew he wouldn’t.

Just when he thinks of that moment, where Nico parted in the past instead of staying, Nico presses a kiss to his ear.

“I loved all of it,” Nico whispers.

“Me, too,” Jason agrees, but the point stands—cuddling is his favorite part.

He thinks back to an evening in the gazebo, where he pretended his death hadn’t happened. They could talk in the darkness of the gardens, Nico eating at pomegranate seeds and Jason awkwardly trying to grow flowers while flicking away dead bugs. They’d laughed, like old times, and Jason never wanted that image to fade.

“We’re as bad as your parents, you know,” Jason mumbles, and Nico laughs.

“Oh gods,” Nico groans, and his hand just lingers at the side of Jason’s head.

“To be fair,” Jason says, “they’re my favorite parents.”

Nico snorts. “You say that because you weren’t subjected to the Plato talk.”

“Maybe,” Jason mumbles, and he laughs. He turns, finally, resting his head against Nico’s lap, and takes in the sight of his beautiful boyfriend. Nico’s quiet, yet effervescent smile, and his charcoal eyes, and his silky hair, after the warm shower. Lightly, he teases in the Hades impression that drives Nico crazy, “Take my heart when you go, my dove.”

“Please,” Nico presses a kiss right above Jason’s temple. “We go together.”

At that answer, all Jason can do is smile. He closes his eyes, burying himself in Nico’s hoodie and just breathes. 

“We go together,” he agrees.

*

There are a few more moments like that during their stay. Jason often walks down the halls of the palace, catching up with the ghouls and ghosts that were willing to entertain him during his time in the Underworld. Hades’s eyes twinkle fondly as he delves into millennia of tales since his existence--of all of the valiant conquests he had with his siblings, of the many places Persephone and he danced and fell in love a thousand times and in many different ways. Nico mentions Hazel once—and that’s all it takes for both edges of Hades’s mouth to lift.

“We’ll tear them away from praetor stuff next time,” Jason reassures. “Making time for family is important.”

“All I can hope for is that she’s happy up there,” Hades says.

“You could just ask,” Nico points out.

“She can come and go as she pleases,” Hades says with just as much somberness. “And if she chooses to remain above, happy, then I’m not one to complain.”

“What happened to Death waits for no one?” Jason asks, which is when Persephone joins in with a prickly laughter.

Hades makes a face, akin to Nico, but concedes. “Need I remind you that Death is _agonizingly_ waiting for you, dear nephew.”

In the end, he promises to _consider_ asking Hazel in a dream, and Persephone congratulates the pair for convincing her husband of a decision for the first time since the Second Titan War.

“Who convinced him that time?” Jason had asked.

“Who else?” Persephone snorted, and she gestured once more to an indifferent Nico. Jason could only laugh then, too.

Shockingly—no one catches them in the gazebo—even when Jason thinks they’ve lain far too long on their picnic blanket. Long enough that Jason asks if Nico is okay at least four times, while his boyfriend lays beside him and casually eats a brownie off his stomach.

(Jason learns yet another valuable lesson about sex: clenching goes hand-in-hand with fingering, and Nico’s never going to stop finding new ways to surprise him.)

“What if the flowers tell Persephone?” Jason asks sleepily, when he thinks a magnolia has been eying him far too suspiciously.

Nico snorts, his face still flushed, and hair mottled with leaves from being pushed into the grass. He’s indifferent, however, as he dusts the crumbs off Jason’s stomach. “You act like they haven’t done worse in this very gazebo.”

Jason makes a sound. “You think they had sex in the gazebo?”

_“We_ just had sex in this gazebo,” Nico retorts, and there’s as much amusement there as when Jason asked why Nico had a bottle of lube in his nightstand. Jason’s nightstand in Cabin One only ever held a picture of Thalia and some hand lotion—specifically because winter winds tended to make his hands dry. And maybe a knife, too, but he’s never had the best memory.

Jason laughs, despite himself, and he just admire the way Nico just sidles closer after finishing his brownie. “I like seeing you like this.”

“Half-naked and cuddling?” Nico muses.

“Happy.” Jason rakes a hand through Nico’s hair, if only to loosen some of the twigs. There’s a flower under his ear—Jason might’ve gotten a little too excited by the end of it. “Not just with me, but with Hazel and Frank, and Connor and Travis…and even Will, really.”

Jason’s hand pauses for a moment, and he notices the way Nico’s cheek rests against his shoulder—soft and yielding for his eyes only.

“I’m glad I get to be a part of this life with you, too,” Jason says, and he tests the waters. “One where you’re happy.”

His death is still heavy on his breath, but it’s grown lighter each day since he walked out of Elysium.

The weight of it is heavy—it’s why Percy was adamant he shouldn’t lift a finger, why every conversation with Piper and Leo this past summer began with asking how he was feeling, why Thalia insisted on staying at Camp Halfblood a week instead of the one day that Jason had grown used to, and why Nico sometimes still wakes him up just to make sure he isn’t dead.

Eventually, the days where he’s alive again will outgrow the ones where he wasn’t, and Jason thinks he’ll never be that two-year-old little boy who wandered around the woods crying for his mom and sister again. Crying for someone to find him.

“I used to think my happiness was tied to Bianca,” Nico confesses quietly. He runs a hand across Jason’s forearm. “That’s why I tried so hard to find her. I was worried no one else would ever understand me. And when you died—it hurt. I felt hollow.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I know,” Nico says gently. “I don’t ever want to feel the way I felt when Bianca died.”

He grazes Jason’s forearm.

“And I felt better, eventually, after you died,” Nico confesses. “Connor and Travis told me they weren’t going to let me leave again. Percy and Annabeth said they wanted to take better care of me this time. Hazel—she would never want anything less than happiness for me. Even Will tried, in his own way, but being in a relationship wasn’t going to wash all of my problems away.”

“But you got there.”

“I got _somewhere_ ,” Nico corrects. “I don’t need my happiness tied to one person, ever. Even my sister thought it was better for me to move on and find a new happiness. I should be happy, freely, and that was hard for me to learn. I needed to learn that lesson.”

“Nico,” Jason says, and he suddenly sits up right, so they can stare at each other. He swallows, hard, and his chest aches. “I know you said you were different for me, compared to Piper, but—if I _ever_ make you miserable, if you ever fall out of love with me—”

“I won’t,” Nico dismisses, and his hand is still intertwined with Jason’s own. The edge of his lip curls, the amusement twinkling in his eyes in a way that’s reminiscent to his father. “I spent two years unwinding all of the things that _shrouded_ me from being happy, and…I got somewhere. I’m better now, at sixteen, than I was at ten. But—”

Nico gives Jason’s hand a squeeze.

“—for all of those people who helped me feel less hollow after your death,” Nico admits slowly, “I didn’t feel full until you were there again.”

Jason’s eyebrows furrow together. His eyes glisten with a sheen of tears.

“I didn’t _need_ Will to make me happy,” Nico says. “You make me happy in a different way. And I _want_ to be happy, with you.”

He leans up and brushes a gentle kiss to the corner of Jason’s mouth. The tips of his fingers brush against Jason’s jaw so gently that Jason can practically feel it holding his heart.

“I love you, Jason,” Nico murmurs.

“I love you too,” Jason says, and he’s never going to get tired of saying that or hearing it from Nico.

They hold onto each other a little longer, knowing that in the morning, they’ll get to go home together. Again.

“You’re Elysium for me, you know,” Jason murmurs.

“Don’t start with that.” Nico only laughs, velvety and sweet like flower petals. “Dad might steal it from you.”

*

In the middle of the very last night, Jason wakes up for a bowl of cereal. Nico’s sound asleep in the satin sheets, his breath gentle against the pillow. Visiting the Underworld feels as casual as visiting New Rome at this point, with the occasional visit to Elysium, or lounging in the Fields of Asphodel like sitting under Thalia’s tree.

It’s not quite the same as when he was dead—the ghosts can’t touch him and almost forget he’s there. Before he can get too sad, Esperanza and Emily tell him that every day he’s distant from Elysium is a day he’s happy—and that was the one thing that Underworld couldn’t give him. 

He runs into Hades in the kitchen, sitting in a tiny breakfast nook with heather gray, skull-printed wallpaper. There’s a black wooden table with legs encrusted with rubies, and a vase filled with gold metal roses. Jason just stares as Hades pushes a box of Raisin Bran in his direction.

“Don’t tell Persephone,” Hades grumbles, “she thinks the fruit is too wrinkled.”

It’s a strange sight of course, the King of the Dead in silk bed robes and fuzzy slippers. Jason’s pretty sure Nico has the same pair in Cabin Thirteen. The thought alone must be obvious on Jason’s face.

“She told me you moved into my cabin,” Hades says, “I’m flattered.”

“Nico’s a much better interior designer than whoever decorated Cabin One,” Jason jokes. A bowl appears across from him, and Jason settles down to pour cereal.

When he looks up, Jason can’t help but blush—he thinks Hades might have found out about all of the shenanigans in the garden. But then, Hades reaches over and pours more cereal in his own bowl. It’s the only time they can get away without eating Lucky Charms and Captain Crunch. Jason has spent many months watching Hades pull out an apple or just starving. After all, it’s not like the King of the Dead _needs_ sustenance. Hades likes to eat to spend more time with his wife, and with his family.

“Did she tell you why?” Jason asks.

“More or less,” Hades says. He pauses briefly as Alecto suddenly lands, perched at an empty seat, and spoon feeds him.

“Thank you for that,” Jason says. “For taking me in. There was no reason for you to have to, but—you did anyway.”

Hades stares at him, hard. For all of the comparisons that made Jason slip up and call the Hades _Nico_ , there’s nothing like having the King of the Dead stare into his soul. “Of all of the ways my son has suffered and how people treated him, you weren’t one of those reasons. Not until you died and entered my realm.”

Jason swallows hard. He thinks back to his conversation with Nico.

“My children are rarely happy,” Hades continues. “Even a celebration of someone’s death ends with tears. Yours certainly was. If I can do anything in my power to contribute to their happiness—even as minor as ignoring a tinder as it burns or taking my daughter’s name off Thanatos’s list—then so be it.”

“Would you have let me go then?” Jason blinks in surprise. “If I just asked?”

A smirk curls against Hades’s lips, amused in a tired way that seems to run in the family. Jason has even seen Hazel flash something similar when the Apollo Cabin looks at her funny.

“Asking was far too easy, and you already knew that,” the King of the Dead says. “There are those who _dare_ to defy death, like how your friend had the Physician’s Cure, or how my brother turned your sister into a tree, to keep her from entering my realm. I would have let you go the moment you asked for a test because you wanted to _earn_ your second chance.”

Hades snorts, offering a wry look as he stirs his cereal.

“Even your father cheated when we divided the mortal realm,” he continues. He pauses briefly once again. “Zeus made sure he would get the heavens. Poseidon was careful to take the less of two evils.”

“You’re not evil, sir.”

“Tell Disney that,” Hades mutters. “You’re nothing like that irritating brother of mine. I loathed him, for the better part of a century after he killed my beloved Maria.”

“Nico’s mom,” Jason says, and Hades lowers his head into one swift nod.

“And yet he has the _nerve_ to conceive two additional children of his own, after forcing us into an oath,” Hades continues to rant, and Jason nervously swallows his latest scoop of cereal. He thinks Hades is glaring at him—but then he notices, Hades staring contemplatively, like he did the very first day Jason was in his throne room. “He wanted so badly to have a stake in the Great Prophecy. And badly, to have himself represented in his Roman Camp. And yet his daughter chose to swear her life to another deity entirely, before the prophecy could affect her, and his son—”

Jason watches Hades’ expression change.

“—and his son sits before me, loving my own son at death and new wake,” Hades says. The corner of his lip etches into a smile, and Jason can’t help but flush as the pride is evident in the King of the Dead’s face. “Of the three of us who divided the realms, he’s the only one whose children turned away from him after being neglected far too long. And the only one who has to ask why his children won’t visit.”

“He’s…” Jason heaves a heavy sigh—one that he’s carried since coming back to life and moving out of Cabin One. “He’s not the greatest. Or the best.”

Hades snorts, and Jason suddenly wants to go to New Rome and update the crypt where the Shrine to Pluto rests. He thinks it should’ve been at the forefront of his mind.

“He never was,” Hades says. “He’s a brat.”

Jason wants to laugh. Of all of the things his father’s been called in his time alive, _brat_ isn’t one of those words. He guesses having an older brother just has that effect.

“Keep making my son happy, nephew,” Hades says, and he pushes the bowl of Raisin Bran way. “I promise that you won’t have to prove your worth the second time you die.”

Jason smiles. “Um, Uncle?”

“Yes?”

“Thank you,” Jason says, and he finishes his own bowl. “Not just for giving me a second chance, but for being my uncle. For being my parent.”

Hades pauses, his own eyebrows furrowing together in confusion. The spirits in his robes seems to stall, staring at him in the same way as their master.

“I didn’t receive a parent’s love until I died,” Jason says quietly. “So, thank you. I know you said your children rarely end up happy but—with Jupiter as my father, I…could never be myself.”

Again, King Hades tilts his head, evidently as flattered as finding out Jason was staying in Cabin Thirteen. Jason’s seen that look before—after Jason confessed that he wanted to make the Underworld better for Hades’ people, starting with a shrine to the Queen. Maybe it was cheeky back then—but sitting here across from Hades feels more comfortable than standing in front of his father’s statue ever did.

“And thank you,” Jason decides to add, “for fixing me.”

This time, Hades arches an eyebrow. Jason suddenly flushes again. The words come out of his mouth before he can realize what he’s doing, and he thinks he’s going to die from embarrassment—but there’s only relief. He’s been grateful ever since that first night in Cabin Thirteen.

“I know you say I’m nothing like my father—and maybe it’s better that I’m not. Nico says trying to be perfect is what killed me. Persephone said one moment of catching my dad’s eye isn’t worth sacrificing my own happiness. And my friends never want me to get to the point again where I consider my own life disposable,” Jason says. “You’ve…made my body one less thing to worry about.”

“Ah,” Hades says suddenly, as it occurs to him. “I assume you mean your eyes.”

“Um, no sir. All of me.”

To his surprise, Hades’s face scrunches. He sizes Jason up considerably, to the point Jason has to run the words back through his head to make sure they made sense.

“Um,” Jason tries, his cheeks flourishing red. He can feel the heat at the tips of his ears. “I’m never going to have as many… _conquests_ as my dad.”

The words sink in for the King of the Underworld. There’s no way to have this conversation with his boyfriend’s dad _without_ it sounding awkward. As much as Jason yearned for his father’s approval in the past, it always came with omitting the other parts of his father’s notorieties. After all, gods weren’t shining examples for model behavior—and that especially includes Jupiter. Hades has always been vocal about his disapproval of the King of the Gods.

Right now, Hades continues to be dismissive of Zeus. _Conquests_ doesn’t hold the same depth on Jason’s conscious as it does for the god in front of him.

“I recall a vow to grow old together,” Hades offers helpfully—and Jason suddenly wonders just how much of that conversation was divulged to the queen and king. “When I say you’re nothing like your father, I mean it in a good way. You’ve represented his other realms of strength. Truth and justice. You grew into the leadership role far better than he did, in your short life. Admittedly—I healed your eyes out of spite against Asclepius.”

Hades stares up expectantly, waiting for Jason’s reaction. Jason only blinks.

“The God of Medicine insults me by letting a mortal cheat death with the physician’s cure,” Hades explains wryly. “What better way to insult a _doctor_ than to invalidate his _prescription_?”

Jason stares in disbelief.

“However,” Hades says with finality. He stares at Jason, as though inspecting Jason’s essence once more. “I never _fixed_ you, nephew. For me to fix you would imply that you were _broken_.”

Oh.

“And,” Hades finishes, “I’m fond of the qualities you have that are different from my brother. And the ones that you kept.”

Jason swallows, dropping his spoon back in his bowl. Even Alecto stares inquisitively from her perch at the kitchen table, while Jason tries to make sense of his Uncle’s words.

Then, Hades stands to his feet and glares at the souls trying to eat crumbs in his robes. “Best you go back to bed, nephew. Otherwise you’ll worry Nico.”

“Yeah,” Jason agrees. “Okay.”

They wander down the corridor, side-by-side, and eventually part ways. Hades offers him a soft, muted smile that Jason’s seen many times on his own boyfriend’s face. Maybe it shows in Jason’s face. Maybe Hades wanted Jason to go back to bed, so he didn’t have to worry, either.

Nico rolls towards him when Jason slinks back into bed. He takes one sniff. “Did you and Dad find the Raisin Bran?”

“He said Persephone doesn’t like the way raisins wrinkle,” Jason explains.

“He doesn’t even need to eat,” Nico mutters. “Not like he’s going to _die_ of starvation.”

Jason laughs, but it comes out tight.

“What’s wrong?” Nico’s awake immediately.

It takes a moment for Jason to answer. He doesn’t _hurt_ , after that conversation. If anything, he’s able to breathe better. “He said my body wasn’t broken. That I’m—that there’s nothing about me to fix.”

Nico props onto an arm, and cups Jason’s face towards his. “There never was.”

“I know,” Jason agrees.

“You love differently, Jason,” Nico continues. “That’s all it is.”

“That’s not all it is,” Jason says. He stares at the ceiling, thinking of all of his friends that are waiting for them to come back to the surface.

He knows there are different loves—sisterly love, for Thalia and Persephone. Parental love, like Emily and Esperanza, and Hades, platonic love for Leo and Piper, familial love for the pack, emotional love, for Nico. And then there’s sex, but even _making_ love felt more emotional than just getting off.

He loves being able to wake up to Nico as much as he loves watching Nico tilt his head back in pleasure. Maybe more so, because he gets to fall asleep beside his boyfriend and repeat the cycle—of waking up and falling a little deeper in love with Nico.

“What do you think it is?” Nico asks him, when he’s quiet too long.

“I’m not sure yet,” Jason admits. “But I’m close.”

*

Thalia and Reyna come shortly after their trip to the Underworld.

Jason feels like Thalia shrinks every time he sees her. She holds the tiara of Artemis’s lieutenant—the new purpose in her life when she thought everything was gone. She’s fifteen to Jason’s stunted sixteen-technically-eighteen, but she holds her head high, the electric hue of her eyes sparking as they meet his gaze.

Thalia’s shoulders are straight. Her posture isn’t one of battle—but Jason’s learned by now that she’s ready to draw her spear at even the slightest sound. He’s not sure who breaks off running first—Jason is pushing off his heels and sprinting towards his big sister as he sees her crossing the entrance of Camp Halfblood. She hardly has one foot through the door before he soars.

They meet at her tree, Jason’s arms thrown over his _big_ sister’s shoulders—and he suddenly feels _small_ and _young_ in Thalia’s grip.

“Easy now,” Thalia teases, though she makes no notion to loosen her grip. “I can’t promise Reyna won’t come after you if you break me, little brother.”

“Just a little longer,” Jason jests, and he all but squeezes the life out of her with his hug. “Just—a _whole week!_ We can team up for capture the flag, do the sing-along contests—”

“You’re trying to _keep_ me here, right?” Thalia muses. They pull away from one another, and the smiles between them feel like no time has passed at all. Her hands fall to Jason’s face, still soaking in the fact that he’s alive again. Soaking in the fact that they’re together. For all of the teasing that’s ready at the edge of her tongue, Jason sees nothing but the same love and kindness that greeted him the first time they met.

“Funny,” Nico suddenly says, and he suddenly appears beside Jason. “I recall saying the same thing when he was trying to get _me_ to stay.”

Thalia’s eyes slowly flicker back to Nico, and there’s a subtle shift in the air. She looks at him from feet to eyes, taking in how much Nico’s grown, too. “Hi, Nico.”

The same dull curtness is prevalent in Nico’s voice. He smiles at her, the corners of his lips not quite meeting his eyes the way Jason’s grown used to. “Hi, Thalia.”

“Hi, Nico,” says Reyna—and she finally catches up beneath Camp Halfblood’s infamous pine tree. “Jason.”

“Reyna,” Jason greets.

He’s as mystified at Reyna’s presence as he was on his birthday—how _young_ she looks now, compared to two years ago after the second war. Her skin glows with the eerie luminescence of the moon, silky hair decorated with a silver tiara. Long Island fall is already teasing the first snows of a Long Island winter, and the silver parka is a vast change to the golden praetor armor and purple robes that Jason had grown used to seeing on his old senior officer.

There’s a new poise to her expression when they greet each other. It folds with a warm, familiar smile with Nico near.

She reaches out with a cordial hand—and Nico shrinks the gap with a tight hug. There’s a brevity of relief that flashes through Reyna’s eyes—and slowly, she closes their embrace.

“It’s good to see you,” Jason thinks he hears Reyna whisper.

“It’s _always_ good to see you,” Nico corrects.

There isn’t particularly anything _interesting_ that brings Reyna and Thalia to Camp Halfblood. It makes the visit even more special. Thalia doesn’t have to spend her time breaking up fights between the Huntresses and campers. Jason doesn’t have to fight for her attention away from Phoebe. She isn’t Artemis’s lieutenant right now—just the big sister that Jason yearns to know now, after thirteen years of yearning for a family.

They go to Artemis’s Cabin first, where both huntresses say a soft prayer to their patron goddess and wish their pack the best of luck. Nico and Jason show them the rearrangements in Cabin Thirteen—which is adorned with textbooks, small monopoly figures for new temples, and flowers. They walk past Cabin One without ever once giving it a glance.

Then, after a quick snack at the Mess Hall, they part ways. Nico presses a pleasant kiss on Jason’s temple.

“Spend time with your sister,” he says. “I know that’s what you want.”

“I could practically say the same thing to you,” Jason jokes.

Nico flashes a look of amusement—then gathers Reyna so they can head to the Big House and enjoy a cup of hot cocoa. Before they leave, Jason is privy to the sight of Thalia muttering something in Reyna’s ear. The old praetor rolls her eyes and gives Thalia a tiny nudge. Thalia laughs and presses a kiss to the corner of Reyna’s mouth.

“You never actually told me how that happened,” Jason muses when Reyna and Nico shrink in the distance. They find themselves back at the pine tree where Jason used to sit when he missed his sister. Nothing makes Jason feel more like a regular kid than being able to talk to Thalia. He’s quick to forget the mace canister around her beltloop holds a spear, and that his own gladius is sitting across from him. They change out their weapons for a plate of cookies instead. “How you got together, I mean.”

The corner of Thalia’s lips etches in an awkward smile, and she wipes chocolate from the corner of her lip. “Death makes you do crazy things, I guess.”

“You haven’t died, though.”

“ _You_ did.” Thalia sets her cookie down, and she silently leans closer to him. Her expression is contemplative as she seeks out the right words. “We never spent enough time together when you were alive the first time. I used to think we had all the time in the world to catch up, but…”

Her voice trails off. Jason finds himself in this situation a lot nowadays with his friends. All of the ones who mourned his death and are still stuck in that mindset even now, two years since Caligula stabbed him. There are so many regrets that arose when Jason died—but they don’t matter now. Shouldn’t, because he’s here.

“Death is inevitable for us,” she finishes. “And I knew that if I were to die the next day, I’d want to do it without having any regrets.”

“I know a thing or two about having regrets,” Jason mutters, and he stifles the reminder of all of those negative emotions swelling in his troubled heart back during his birthday. He smiles instead, watching as Thalia’s eyes follow the trail to the Big House. “Reyna made Camp Jupiter bearable for me. I’m happy you two found each other.”

“Believe me, baby brother,” Thalia agrees. “No one is happier than me.”

He can see it in the way she smiles. In that moment, she’s even less of Artemis’s Lieutenant or the daughter of Zeus. Jason sees the resemblance between his sister and himself—so very much in love with the people that forged new paths in their lives.

And he thinks back to what Persephone told him when they were in the gardens. How _little Thalia_ and _little Jason_ love the same.

Jason sits up abruptly, almost knocking their cookies over.

He wonders how much truth was in Persephone’s statement.

“What’s up, Jay?” Thalia asks.

“I—” Jason halts for a moment. He stares at her blue eyes—the only feature that _ever_ made them look related. And suddenly he’s wondering if there’s _more_ that can’t be seen. “Did you…always know you were going to end up with Reyna?”

She snorts. “What, like love at first sight?”

“I…yeah. Yeah, I guess so. “

Thalia looks amused by his question. She pushes their plate of cookies away and shrugs. “Believe me. Nothing will _ever_ sweep you off your feet more than a girl pinning you to the floor and breaking one of your ribs. I knew I _needed_ to be her friend.”

She pauses, and then pulls an envelope out of her parka jacket. Jason recognizes the purple seal immediately—and the tiny inscribed letters of the Twelfth Legion Fulminata. The outside of the letter shows Reyna’s elegant cursive—and Jason can practically _smell_ the principia against the paper. At Thalia’s quiet insistence, Jason unfurls the paper. The first thing that catches his sight is the date of the letter. It’s _old_ by today’s standards—but Jason can pinpoint the month and day back to right after Gaea’s defeat.

The little letters that Jason used to teasingly call Thalia’s declarations of love.

“But,” Thalia admits quietly, “I knew we needed to be _more_ , when she started writing me letters back. Reyna wanted to get to know me as much as I wanted to know her.”

“ _Gods_ , Thalia,” Jason says. He can feel the intensity of her words thrumming in the parchment paper between his fingers. Jason decides not to read it—he thinks it’s too invasive. But he thinks about the pocket Thalia kept the letter zipped in, so close to her heart.

“It’s the first one she ever gave me,” Thalia confesses. There’s a sheepish smile to her face, and she nudges Jason carefully. “You let a good one go, you know.”

“Way too good for me. Perfect for you,” Jason says. Even after—what, two years?—of dating, Jason watches as Thalia’s smile lifts and her cheeks dust pink.

“We’re a good match.” Thalia crosses her arms and leans into her pine tree, a contemplative look across her face. “I thought I’d lost everything when I came back to life. When I swore an oath to my lady, I…never thought I could love again. Not like Luke.”

“Did you ever try?”

“Annabeth and I had a semester at an all-girls school before I swear an oath,” Thalia admits. “There was one girl. We went on a couple of dates. She was nice and…normal. I’m not normal.”

Jason laughs quietly and leans in to soak in the wry expression on her face.

“We went through the notions and I… _thought_ those were the things I should enjoy. But you know—terrible prophecy and all that bullshit.” There’s still a sliver of annoyance across Thalia’s expression, even now after having long sworn an oath to Artemis. She takes a long, tired breath and crosses her arms. “There were other things going on. No time for a _normal_ relationship. And it’s much harder working into conversation that I used to be a _tree_ with mortals.”

“And Reyna’s better than normal,” Jason speculates.

At the mention of her girlfriend’s name, the corner of Thalia’s lips rises again. “Reyna’s everything I could have asked for.”

The intensity of her words strikes a chord with Jason. He can’t help but mirror her smile.

But mostly importantly—what she said about the nameless girl in her last semester as an aging teenager strikes an even stronger chord. All he can think about is how Piper has described their relationship in the past.

The Love Goddess and the Goddess of Marriage _._ All of the mentions of this, with a war going on in the background…

And getting to _know_ someone, versus all of the pressure of being together with someone else because the world deemed it _normal._

“Have you ever…” Jason swallows hard, and for some reason, his heart is loud in his chest. Screaming against his ribcage. “Have you ever had trouble with other people in the past?”

There are more words Jason could use. His heart is pulsing quickly, thrumming with the message that he’s _alive_ and needs to use better words. He wants to know the word. _Needs_ to.

They love the same. Little Jason and little Thalia _love_ the same. They love _differently._

The back of his throat is dry, parched for the answer he’s long sought since coming back to life. Maybe before, too—something he didn’t know he needed an answer _to._

“I used to get in trouble with a _lot_ of people,” Thalia jokes, and her eyes flash with amusement. “You’re going to have to be a little more specific, little brother.”

Jason’s cheeks grow hot. His palms are sweaty, and for some reason, he’s nervous. “Your past relationships. Did you…ever have trouble with them?”

“Trouble how?”

“Sexually.” This time, Jason swallows hard, the word coming out strained from the back of his throat. “Did you ever have trouble reciprocating?”

He's not sure what to expect. Maybe a weird look, like the one Annabeth and Piper gave him years ago the first time Piper and he tried to have sex. Maybe the stun that Nico gave him when they were at the pier in Montauk, when he insisted that he didn’t like Nico because he liked boys better than girls. He thinks— _knows_ —he likes them both equally—but there needs to be more to it, too.

Instead, Thalia Grace—the sister that Jason never got to know—stares back at him, unfazed and fascinated in his words. She’s not weirded out—not even at the aspect of talking about their sex lives together. Jason used to avoid the topic of love when he thought the Huntresses swore off love.

Most importantly, Thalia doesn’t look surprised. At all. “Do you?”

“I did.” And then it all comes out. Jason never had a lot of relationships to begin with. Crushes in New Rome always seemed to revolve around his lineage and his title. _Piper_ was the first real relationship he had, and after many conversations with Silena Beauregard in the last two years, he’s not even sure if _that_ was entirely real. There were so many failures in that relationship—emotionally and physically, and the two issues are so tangled together that undoing even one knot feels like it would take an eternity. They’re better off as friends.

And there was the speculation with his new body. It’s _new_ and _responds_ to Nico, who Jason spent so many months trying to get to know after the war with Gaea. Who Jason talked to about his insecurities, about his likes and dislikes, and who he spent hours fondly daydreaming of while in class, when he knew Nico couldn’t be his. Who was Elysium for Jason when Elysium was _miserable._

Except Hades told Jason he didn’t need to be _fixed_ because he wasn’t _broken._ Things were never going to work out with Piper—maybe because of how their relationship started, so shallow and based on memories Jason could never retrieve because he never had them. Even when the Mist altered his memories, he was never given those starlit nights at Wilderness School with Leo and Piper. With everything going on with the war, there was never time to fill those expectations Piper had—no time for a relationship, just like in the first war.

But _gods_ , Nico. Nothing has felt more validating than the love of his life telling him it’s _okay_ that he loves differently. Their love was built far before they had to worry about the physical aspect of things. Jason doesn’t think he’s ever going to find anything better than Nico—and he doesn’t intend on ever having to search.

When he’s finally done, Jason’s throat is strained. He stares back at Thalia, who drank in all of his words without halting.

She nods in understanding. No weird looks, no confusion. Only a knowing smile. “There’s a word for that, baby brother.”

Jason could probably cry. “There is?”

“Yeah,” Thalia says, and Jason’s spent so long _dwelling_ that he’s put off by the fact that she’s leaning so casually against her tree.

“Is it…new? Is it a curse? Is it a Jupiter thing?”

“Not a curse. And not new. Probably not a _Jupiter_ thing. I’m sure it’s been around for centuries—mortals just haven’t put a name to it until recently.” Thalia chuckles softly. “Maybe it’s a _Grace_ thing.”

Whatever she says next holds Jason’s heart along with it. He could laugh with joy to have something else in common with his big sister. “What is it?”

*

Demisexual.

Demisexual, demigod Jason Grace.

Ace Jace Grace.

Sort of ace.

Demi.

“A sexual orientation where people only experience sexual attraction to folks that they have close emotional connections with.” Nico falls quiet for a moment as he finishes reading the paragraph in his textbook. “Something about this makes me think you might like me.”

“I asked you to grow old with me, didn’t I?”

“You declared. I asked.” Nico traces the title in his textbook—something Jason spent the whole evening doing before Nico returned to Cabin Thirteen. He thinks the page is worn from his own thumb eagerly flipping between the pages to dissect as much information as he can. “How does that make you feel?”

There isn’t a lot. Thalia described all that she could about the subject. Jason soaked in every word and every piece that she had to offer. Asexually was a spectrum, she explained. Many of the huntresses fell somewhere on it—including his own sister. Some people never wanted to have sex at all—repulsed at the idea of it. Others—they were okay with it some degree. But the _sex_ part of the relationship was always minor, compared to the romantic part—and even _that_ varied. Romantic, aromantic, demiromantic—

—they’re all new words, but click as easily in his mind as summoning storms, Latin phrases, or growing flowers.

And Jason truly, deeply loves Nico. He smiles just at the thought of it.

He thinks he’s _wanted_ that emotional connection ever since taking the chalice out of Nico’s hands. Maybe even before that.

The bed creeks as Nico slides into it. His hand climbs up the rivets of Jason’s abs before resting against Jason’s heartbeat.

“It feels like me,” Jason says finally. His hand falls to the small of Nico’s waist, and he welcomes the other demigod against him. No one else. Not his dad, not something done for the sake of praetorship—just him.

Demisexual Jason Grace.

Nico raises his head and presses a kiss to the shell of his ear. Under the soft light of his lamp, Jason sees nothing but a loving gaze in his boyfriend’s eyes. “I _love_ you. All of you.”

“I love you too,” Jason whispers back. “All of you.”

There’s more to the words now. Jason loves the entirety of his boyfriend—emotionally, physically, and everything in between. Under the shadows, Nico’s lips curls into a loving smile.

With one last kiss, they settle in for the night for a deep, worriless slumber.


End file.
